


precocious

by devilishMendicant



Series: koi's ddlc baby fics (aka the magical ballpit) [2]
Category: Doki Doki Literature Club! (Visual Novel)
Genre: (in the past), Age Regression/De-Aging, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Vomiting, Wetting (implied), just bc it wasn't and isn't the focus pfft, monika is also implied to have been a part of the relationship before the Plot Happened, the relationship is mostly domestic and there are no explicitly romantic moments
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-23
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-02 02:41:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 20,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23797828
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilishMendicant/pseuds/devilishMendicant
Summary: The only thing that could possibly make “waking up disoriented on the floor of your clubroom looking like a baby” any worse - wait, no, tack on “and totally unable to access your awe-inspiring reality altering powers” - was, for some reason she absolutely could not figure out, having her hand throbbing in pain. It was actually, probably, the second worst thing that has ever happened to her in her long and storied life.
Relationships: Natsuki/Sayori/Yuri (Doki Doki Literature Club!)
Series: koi's ddlc baby fics (aka the magical ballpit) [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1713370
Comments: 14
Kudos: 61





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> the "now it's not a oneshot in an unrelated collection" edition!

“My, isn’t someone precocious?”

“N-No-o,” Monika wheezes, trembling and silently willing Natsuki to _walk away,_ to just, call Yuri out of the classroom and walk away, to go back home— go, back to Sayori’s house, _please,_ “N-No pe— pe’coww-shush!”

She hates that word. She didn’t know that she hated it until the ~~_gigantic monster_~~ ~~Headmaster Shimizu~~ man in front of her was saying it, gazing down at her with that weird look that grownups give other people’s babies - smiling and ‘aren’t you so cute’ and ‘oh can’t I hold her’? Monika has had more than enough of _other people holding her_ today, even stuck-up jerk _President Haruko_ from the _Debate Club_ wanted to hold her and Monika had seen Yuri giggling and it _was not funny,_ and she’s exhausted and sick of being in a carrier all day and she wants Yuri to come back and hold her and _go home._

So, of course, Yuri didn’t emerge from the classroom and Natsuki continued to stand awkwardly and rather nervously in the hallway with— him, and Monika _hates_ how he’s looking at her, and the words that he said, and she feels Natsuki’s arms tighten, at least, and knows nee— _Natsuki_ isn’t going to let him hold her, and that _might_ have soothed her pounding heart if not for,

Well,

“How precious. You girls have yourselves a _perfect_ little lamb, don’t you?”

~~_Not from him._ ~~

Her pulse is _screaming_ in her ears, shaking more than the day this whole ridiculous stupid inexplicable business _started_ and her thoughts barely register that he’s reaching towards her before, just like the first day, her little finger _throbs_ in sharp terrible pain and no, no, no, no, no no no no no no no no _no no no no no no **no,**_

At least she has the presence to fling herself against Natsuki’s shoulder, but even feeling arms curl further still, _protectively,_ probably realizing much too much all at once, isn’t enough to stop the flood of tears and the shrieking, sobbing _wail_ that escapes Monika’s throat.

_"_ _M-Mommmmmyyyyyyy!"_

And, lo and behold, purple eyes widening at the scene she’s walked into - there she is.


	2. Chapter 2

“You know, Monnie, if you keep scowling like that, your face’ll be stuck~!”

 _Good,_ Monika thinks, somehow managing to glower even harder. She probably would have said it, and also a lot of other things that may or may not have been very rude, but as it happened, her mouth was occupied.

“Hey, hey! Don’t do that, hon— I, er. Monnie,” Sayori stammers, gently prying the two small fingers Monika was _chomping_ on away from her mouth. “Doesn’t that _hurt?”_

It wasn’t like the rest of her hand didn’t already hurt, anyway. The only thing that could possibly make “waking up disoriented on the floor of your clubroom looking like a _baby”_ any worse - wait, no, tack on “and totally unable to access your awe-inspiring reality altering powers” - was, for some reason she _absolutely_ could not figure out, having her hand throbbing in pain. It was actually, probably, the second worst thing that has ever happened to her in her long and storied life.

“Hey, c’mon!”

And Sayori’s pulling her fingers back down _again._ Nevermind that Monika can’t exactly remember putting them back in, listen - as _much_ as she appreciates the ridiculous helicoptering, can she not, within her rights as a person, have three minutes to herself that may or may not include biting her hand? Is biting her hand, really, _in the grand scheme of how this day was going,_ something to be worried about?

“... pacifier,” Sayori says, sort of to herself, and Monika removes her fingers from between her teeth for the third time with a flush.

_"No!”_

“You _can_ talk!” Exclaims Sayori, to which Monika _glowers._ “... okay, okay. Look, Mons, you can’t just chomp on your hand. It’s, like... unsanitary?”

“No!”

“That hand was _definitely_ on the ground sometime today. In the clubroom. Don’t you know the kind of stuff we drop in the clubroom?”

“...”

Sayori looks at Monika expectantly.

“... cu’bbakes,” Monika grumbles, now glaring mostly at the ground of the— ughhhh, _baby store—_ and Sayori, _goddamnit Sayori,_ just bursts into an amused fit of half-bitten giggles.

“Okay, okay, you’re not wrong. We do drop a lot of cupcakes,” Sayori admits. “But, like... if you get sick, and you look like you’re, like, three...”

... oh.

What a remarkably good point.

“Plus, I don’t wanna look like a bad mom~!”

Annnnd moment of clarity: gone. Granted, Monika thinks that Sayori is going to deserve a parent of the year award just for not taking one look in the classroom, wheeling around, and saying “wow, this is _somebody else’s problem”_ — but that definitely doesn’t have to mean she has to be even a little pleased by Sayori putting baby supplies in a cart _merrily,_ Monika stuck in the little basket seat, occasionally kicking her shoes back against the metal irately. She’s absolutely positive that Sayori would be _upset_ also, if she’d been the literal toddler in this situation, and Monika would have definitely been treating her with respect and empathy and _not dragging her fingers out again, goddamnit._

“Hey, Mons? You okay?”

... okay, maybe the empathy was there. Sayori doesn’t let go of her hand - _god,_ Monika’s whole hand fit in half of Sayori’s - and looks, well, more worried than she has been for the past hour. More like the original worry, right after the complete disbelief and right before having a slight meltdown because now, apparently, Monika sneezing was adorable.

“You look really nervous,” Sayori continues, to which Monika replies with her absolute _best_ complete deadpan look.

“Yeah, yeah, I know, I get it. But, like. Calm down for a minute? It’s not like you’re, I dunno, on fire. And you still got me an’ Yuri an’ Nacchan, doncha? Everything’s gonna be just fine.”

This, and Sayori’s hand on her head, are... slightly more comforting than she thinks it should be.

“... besides, if you’re worried about someone seeing, I don’t think anyone from class is gonna be walking around in here,” Sayori grins. “Unless there’s some gossip goin’ around you didn’t tell me?”

And back to you, normal Sayori. Monika lets out a huffing sigh, and maybe, _just_ a little, pouts.

Sayori doesn’t do much but ruffle her hair, and toss another thing in the cart.

* * *

“Here, Monnie, how ‘bout this?”

‘This’, as it turned out, was putting Monika down (something she didn’t like very much, _not_ that she was about to mention that to Sayori) in front of a low shelf crammed full of stuffed animals. Monika hopes the look she tosses back over her shoulder can be easily read as _’really.’_

“Yes, really,” says resident dry-look-interpreter Sayori, “You, lil’ miss, need something to hug so I can have all my hands back.”

... damn. Maybe clinging onto Sayori’s hand after their discussion wasn’t the best idea. Then again, Sayori didn’t look mad - just... well. Sayori looked a lot of things, and it was weird for Monika to dwell on most of them, but she didn’t look _mad_ and that was the important part. Not to mention that being on the ground made it much easier to realize that it would be the absolute simplest thing in the world for Sayori to just turn around and _leave,_ and suddenly Monika feels a lot more like humoring her.

So she grabs a stuffed animal, like some kind of toddler. She would like to announce that it was totally at random, so Sayori would be satisfied and pick her up and put her back in the cart and not leave her behind in the store, but that would definitely be lying. She’s allowed to be picky about textures, she thinks, somewhat defensively - she’s had a rough flippin’ morning. If she’s going to have to bury her whole face into a soft, squishy tortoise-shell and lean her whole upper body into it, it’s darn well going to be _minky._

“Oh, I like him,” says Sayori, running a hand lightly over the tortoise’s soft green head. “He’s got a pretty shell. D’you like him too, Monnie?”

Monika nods, face quite obscured by cuddly plush shell, to both of these questions. The tortoise’s shell is blue, which is a color Monika is very fond of for many reasons, and intermittently littered with pastel stars, which she is also fond of. If she was going to be stuck with a toy animal companion, it should at least be a toy animal companion made of things she likes. And if she likes all the things that went into the composition of the tortoise, then that was probably close enough to liking the tortoise to satisfy Sayori.

Monika isn’t very much aware that, somewhere in-between Sayori casually and quietly discussing the toy tortoise while pushing the cart and the shopping being over, she’d dozed off - she blinks back into partial wakefulness, face still mushed into the plushie shell, mostly because of a light tugging on her newfound pillow, and if she wasn’t so darn _tired_ she would probably be mortified that her instinctive response is to curl her arms around it tighter and mumble “Tuw’tewl”, not least because it’s a _tortoise._

“Ssh, Monnie. Masahiro’s just scanning the tag, he’s not taking Turtle.”

Oh. Tur— _the tortoise_ stops being tugged and Monika _almost_ drifts back into sleep, but then what Sayori actually _said_ settles into her head more than the soft shushing and the warm hand in her hair.

_Oh my god, Masahiro was in her **class!**_

Sayori blinks at the little seizing motion Monika jerks into momentarily - watches her shove her face even further into the plush before _she_ remembers, and, well, whoops. She’s looking up with an explanation - well, several alibis and excuses and gigantic lies - already on her lips, but, Masahiro just grins guilelessly, reaching over the counter to pat Monika’s head once or twice.

“Ah, yeah— discount for you, Sayori. Boss insisted,” he says, turning back to the till like this was completely normal.

“... discount?” Sayori manages, trying to resettle her face into something that isn’t completely bewildered.

“Yeah, discount! ‘Cos, you know, you in school with a baby and all. Just said he wanted to help out how he could. Thinks it’s real amazin’ of you to adopt a kid that lil’ just to keep her in the family...”

“...”

“Sayo?”

“Uh— yeah! Ehehe... well, um. You know! How it goes, and uh, yes. Yeah! Um, thanks, Masahiro. Can you tell your boss thanks from me?”

“Oh, sure!” The teen beams, ducking under the counter at the exact right time to miss Sayori’s discovery that, _wow,_ this store was losing money on Sayori’s receipt - “Here, give this to lil’ miss sleepy over there, too. I think she’d like it.”

He passes over a turtle sticker.

“Oh, me too,” Sayori says, before she can catch herself - oh well. It seems true enough, and she tucks it in her pocket, offering Masahiro a smile in return. “Once she wakes up a little more, I think. Seeya later, Masahiro!”

“Seeya, Sayo! Bye-e, Monika!”

* * *

Once they actually get out of the place, Monika has the presence to lift her thoroughly red, embarrassed, one hundred percent adorable little face back out of Turtle’s shell, and Sayori might have made a comment if not for:

A) Monika’s rather _confused and distraught_ expression, and

B) Sayori’s cellphone ringing with the opening bars to _Motteke! Sailor Fuku._

“Natsuki, is it an emergency?” Is what Sayori says when she lifts the phone to her ear, keeping a very worried eye on Monika’s expression - and almost flinching with the volume of her friend’s — datemate’s?? — response.

_”_ _Yeah!_ I hope you didn’t buy the whole fuckin’ store, Sayo!”

_”_ _Ow,_ Nacchan,” Sayori whines, “And of course not! It just took... an hour!” She continues, pulling her phone from her ear briefly to glance at the time. “That’s a perfectly reasonable amount of time to go shopping!”

“Yeah, whatever, smitten kitten,” Natsuki snorts, “The reason I told you that is— oh, _fuck,_ dude - _YURI! Holy shit, look in here!”_

Natsuki yelling to Yuri, still holding the phone to her ear, is going to be the leading cause of Sayori’s tinnitus.

“Nacchan, what the heck are you—“

“Sayo. Babe. Hon.” Natsuki says, very suddenly, and very seriously, and Sayori is getting _terrible_ feelings. “You have to come look at your goddamn house. Right the fuck now, immediately.”

“... my house is different?”

_“_ _Your house is fuckin’—“_

“Very different, yes,” finishes Yuri in a much softer, though still incredibly strange, tone, evidently having pried the phone away from the shoutier girl. “Do you need a ride back home?”

“A-A ride? Why would I... Oh.”

Another glance to the increasingly upset-looking child in the cart knocks Sayori over the head with a Fact, which is that she needs to carry the bags _and_ Monika home, which she _might_ have... forgotten about, very slightly.

“... yeah, um. We need a ride, please.” Sayori continues, feeling like now is about the time to turn the phone off. “Could you, um—“

"Don’t worry, I’ll be there shortly. I have relative confidence that Natsuki is in no danger of hurting herself on any errant corners, here.”

... how... specific.

“Yur—?”

And that was that. Phone hung up, Sayori thoroughly mystified—

“...”

Monika... thoroughly distressed. Which was fair. That was incredibly fair, in fact. That the teller had been _Masahiro_ wasn’t something Sayori had been expecting, and even if - for - some perplexing reason, he had been very much under the impression that this was completely normal, it had probably embarrassed Monika and—

“Y-Y— S-Saay, y, yo-owww, w, wi-ii,”

And Sayori doesn’t hesitate a second - though she isn’t sure _why_ \- before scooping hiccupy, trembling Monika into her arms, mystery momentarily set aside in favor of drying little eyes before all the dangerously teetering tears could start to fall.

* * *

Yuri pulls into the parking lot to find Sayori swaying lightly, arms very occupied with drowsing, tiny Monika and -

“Turtle?”

\- and Sayori has an inkling of what Natsuki had been whooping and hollering about from the moment her eyes alight on the five-point harness nestled in the backseat of Yuri’s car.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one was the one published as a oneshot, in case it looks oddly familiar


	3. Chapter 3

It turns out, probably for the best, that after Monika had conked out on her new soft friend, most of Sayori’s shopping involved less “what do I realistically and reasonably need to take care of a toddling child”, and more... turtles.

“Ohhh, my God,” Natsuki says, gravely, holding up the _ridiculously_ soft and tiny garment with two hands. “You totally got her a turtle onesie.”

Sayori, looking very much like a maraschino cherry, averts her eyes sheepishly.

“It comes,” Natsuki continues, slowly turning it over in her hands, “With a tiny. Built in. Turtle shell. Backpack.”

“M—Masahiro’s boss gave me a 60% discount,” Sayori squeaks, to which Natsuki’s eyes fly open in absolute shock.

_”That hardass?”_

* * *

Eventually, every adult in the house is caught up with the current, apparent, situation:

• Monika is... _somewhere_ in the vicinity of two years old, 

• Sayori has _adopted her,_

• And so has Yuri and Natsuki.

That last bit was sort of and sort of not a surprise - it was _reeling_ when Yuri first wandered into a room and found it top to bottom with _her things,_ but after further consideration of the relationship she and Natsuki (and Monika, but... er.) shared with Sayori, it made some amount of sense. Natsuki, for her part, looked like she was experiencing nirvana when she skidded into the living room to announce that _all_ her things were also safely tucked away in a very very her room - and really, she had _every_ right to be so excited.

Monika had been... less pleased.

To be fair, she had been displeased since about the exact second Sayori had put her down. Very... very displeased. Yanking fruitlessly at harness straps and yelling what was _probably_ intended to be “excuse me, why am I in a child’s car seat,” and “I want Sayori to pick me up right now,” but between the frantic cries and Monika’s speech impediment, none of it was very intelligible except for the mildly totally heartrending sobs of Sayori’s name.

Needless to say, then, Monika was a bit of a grumpy duck by the time she and Sayori became privy to what Sayori’s empty, quiet, 2-story home had become overnight.

“A _playroom?!”_

It was kind of hilarious that Sayori was more excited about this than the actual child in her arms.

“No” was Monika’s entire word of the night. “No” to the playroom; an _emphatic_ “NO” to the nursery, and a blush ten miles wide; “No” to (early) dinner and “No” to toys (except Turtle) and “No” to ever leaving Sayori’s arms at any foreseeable point in the future. Eventually, somewhat out of options, Sayori simply asks if Monika is ready for some sleep, which nets _”No!”_ before a pout and a yawn and a _”Yes,”_ from Sayori, which Monika grumbles only slightly in protest of.

... however.

“No!”

“C’mon, Monnie,” Sayori sighs, “You need jammies bef— pajamas. You gotta sleep in pajamas.”

_”_ _No-o-o-o!”_

(Sayori thinks it’s probably best not to mention how much like a toddler Monika looks, kicking her legs and growling puppishly and hiding her scowling face in her tortoise.)

“You can’t sleep in those clothes, Monnie, they’re dirty!”

“No no _no_ no no no _no!”_

“Monika,” Sayori says, inching closer on the bed, “Come on, these aren’t even little kid pajamas. Gro— adults have them too.”

“Do _no-o-ot,”_ Monika sniffles, which is the most communication she’s given since leaving the car - Sayori hnnphs slightly.

“Do too! I have one!”

“...”

“Monnie?”

Monika mumbles something into her tortoise’s belly.

“Monika, I can’t hear—“

“Dun’t _cownt,”_ says Monika, raising the plushie slightly from her face, and Sayori sputters a bit.

_”_ _He-ey!”_

But Monika is smiling, a tiny bit, and Sayori honestly can’t help but giggle.

“Okay, okay,” she concedes, flopping down to lay beside Monika, “I get it, I’m waaaay too much fun to be an adult...”

That gets a bigger smile out of Monika.

“... would you wear the pajamas if I wore mine, too?” Sayori offers.

“... nngh,” mutters Monika, turning her head, and Sayori bites the inside of her cheek before turning to her one and only dirty trick of the night - she rubs the soft material over Monika’s hand, and the small girl freezes, for a moment.

“...”

“... Monnie?”

“... ‘j-jamaas,” Monika squeaks, and Sayori smiles.

* * *

Monika doesn’t really feel any less silly in the _turtle onesie_ with Sayori accompanying her in a bunny onesie, really. Like, at all. But it’s _really_ soft, and _really_ comfortable, and she is very embarrassed to admit even to herself that she felt very very satisfied, for a second, that she matched Turtle. The tortoise. She meant the tortoise, which doesn’t have a taxonomically incorrect name.

She is even less thrilled that having her clothes changed re-confronted her with the reality that she wasn’t wearing _underwear,_ but nothing had required it to be fussed with, and by god, nothing _ever_ would. Two years old be damned, she was going to use the toilet if she _drowned_ in it. The less thought about what was on her lower half, the better, in her _humble_ opinion - so she turned her attention to Sayori, instead, who was fussing with the bed.

Apparently, to put pillows in between the wall and the mattress. Like Monika would roll into the crack and hurt herself, or something. Sayori, turning around, notices Monika’s probably huffy expression, and just - smiles.

“Just to make it cozy, okay?” She says, all reassuring grin and honeyed tone, and Monika just frowns. Yeah, _right._

Not like she had much of a say in the matter. Up she went (with a little ‘hup!’ from Sayori that was absolutely unnecessary), and down she went - beside the wall-pillow, clutching her tortoise, and staring warily at Sayori’s errant fiddling with something on the end tab— _no._

“Aww, Monika,” Sayori says, but Monika _means_ it. No. No, no, _no_ way is she putting that in her mouth. She said it at the store and she meant it and she meant it _well_ \- no. Pacifier. She glares, and Sayori hums in thought before shrugging, and setting it next to her.

“Okay, Monnie. Whatever you say,” she nods, laying down on her side again and gently _encouraging_ (read: pushing) Monika to do the same. “There you go...”

Monika, fed-up and tired and as unamused as she’s ever been, just growls:

“‘M _notta b-baby.”_

“You’re not a baby,” Sayori nods, humming slightly in a closed-mouth yawn and gently brushing Monika’s bangs away from her forehead, which is a motion that has Monika blinking sleepily, cheek burrowing softly into Turtle and barely noticing when Sayori’s hand moves its focus to the bridge of Monika’s nose. “You’re not. You’re Monika. I know.”

“Mmahmn,” agrees Monika, and then her eyes are closing all by themselves as Sayori smiles.


	4. Chapter 4

“Aww, sleepy lil’ peanut...”

Well, Sayori thinks - either Monika is going to wake up, grumble at Yuri’s cooing, and demand solid food, or Monika is going to remain fast asleep and at least have _something_ in her growly belly, even if it’s probably not what she would prefer. This, and the constant concerned glances over her shoulder, is why she lets Yuri sit against the arm of the couch, with dozing Monika cradled in one arm and turtle-stamped milk bottle in the other hand.

As it turns out, Monika doesn’t stir enough to protest.

Sayori thinks that’s fair. It was a... _trying_ day yesterday, and it still wasn’t altogether too late in the morning today, considering Natsuki was just as well asleep. Monika could sleep in as much as she liked, in Sayori’s opinion.

As long as she didn’t sound painfully hungry.

“Yuri,” Sayori sighs, slipping onto the couch beside them, “it’s just Monika. You know she’s gonna be mad if she wakes up to you makin’ those ‘precious baby darling’ eyes at her.”

“W-Well,” Yuri mumbles, cheeks reddening slightly at Sayori’s pertinent observation, “she isn’t awake _now...”_

“Just letting you know,” Sayori yawns.

She wasn’t sure how it had taken this long to _sink in,_ but - Sayori, looking at Monika’s serenely asleep expression, entire body snugly contained in the crook of Yuri’s arm and snuffling contentedly around the teat of a bottle, doesn’t have the presence to say much else besides:

“... she’s, like... _two.”_

“Mmhm,” replies Yuri, absentmindedly, and Sayori shakes her head.

“I mean— she’s not just. Shorter. She’s like, _two._ She’s drinking while she’s, _mostly_ asleep, and she doesn’t talk like, regularly, and she fell asleep at the store, Yuri, she’s like _two.”_

Yuri is quiet for a little bit at this.

“Do you know why?”

“... no,” Sayori admits, feels the weight of a light blue sun-tipped pen in her fingers for a moment as she thinks of it. “I didn’t do it. I would absolutely remember if I did. And Monika’s so upset about it...”

“That she probably didn’t, either,” Yuri finishes, “At least not on purpose.”

“... yeah.”

... not on purpose. Sayori can’t fathom the idea of _altering the universe by **mistake...**_ but, she can’t fathom this being a conscious choice on anybody’s part, either.

_But at least she’s stuck with us,_ Sayori thinks, and watches Yuri’s quiet, besotted gasp as Monika’s tiny fingers grasp drowsily at her hair.

* * *

Monika is slightly annoyed to wake up and find that she is _not_ in bed.

But at least she’s with Sayori, she acknowledges; burying her still-dozy head against the peach-haired girl’s neck as a sudden giggle escapes said girl, gentle hand reaching behind her to rub circles between her shoulders.

“Good mo~rning, sunshine!” She sing-songs, and Monika would groan if Sayori didn’t just greet the day like that _normally._ “How’d you sleep, pumpkin?”

_Now_ Monika harrumphs, pulling her head back to fix Sayori with a glare.

_”_ _Mon’ka.”_

“Oops— Monika, sorry,” Sayori corrects, looking apologetic enough that Monika lets her pout evaporate.

“Good,” Monika nods, then - mind wandering to the dream she’d had this morning. Mostly fuzzy around the edges, but warm and safe, and tasting faintly of...

“Pancakes, Mons?”

Before Monika can really _dwell_ on the odd, not-morning-breath taste in her mouth, Sayori is stealing her attention with a forkful - a _plastic_ forkful of _pre-cut_ pancake, but. Considering _everything,_ including that she is in Sayori’s lap and not much wanting to leave, Monika will swallow her pride in exchange for swallowing some pancakes, even if, for some reason, her stomach doesn’t feel as empty as dinnerless stomachs should.

(Plus, Sayori looks at Monika chewing a mouthful of pancake like she just won the lottery, and Monika feels - _just_ a little - like Sayori deserves it, considering _everything.)_


	5. Chapter 5

Yuri is very bad at doing things sneakily.

Monika knows this because she has been trying, and failing, to do something very sneakily all day. First it was at breakfast, where she picked Monika up too fast and bounced her on her arm while she cleaned up dishes; then it was sitting with her in the playroom and trying (and failing miserably) to make the disgustingly large amount of baby toys look _interesting,_ and now it was...

“Oh, Monika. How about a story?”

This nonsense. Monika scowls behind two fingers, and Yuri sighs.

“Yes, yes. You’re not a baby. Natsuki likes things read aloud, too, you know.” Monika would probably say ‘that doesn’t count’, but she’s a bit too preoccupied to wrestle her voice into cooperation. She’s pretending that she’s preoccupied with petting Tur— her tortoise plush, but...

“Monika?”

She is not. Monika is shuffling, and squirming, on her seat on the playroom rug - she hasn’t even had all that much to _drink_ today, or yesterday, and she would be huffing in indignation if she weren’t singularly focused on—

“Hmm? Monnie, is something wrong?”

Monika thinks that her scowl very clearly translates to _’stop playing dumb’,_ but Yuri seems to translate it as _’tilt your head and ask again’,_ like some kind of idiot while Monika wriggles in discomfort.

“N-No!”

... well, actually. Yes. Yes, something is wrong, and that much is _obvious,_ and Monika doesn’t know where Yuri got the idea that she was going to be _distracted_ from this frankly painful business because that is _very_ clearly all she’s been doing all day. Monika decides, therefore, to dispel that particular notion.

“... I...”

... if. If she could get over saying it. If she could get over saying it, in clumsy-tongued-two-year-old-ese, to _Yuri_ and all her gently bemused expression.

“... I... Y-Yuwwi—“

“Yes?”

At least she isn’t making fun of her for being _unable to pronounce her name,_ but that somehow doesn’t make Monika feel much better.

“... Y-Yuwwi, I— Yuwwi, I wan— Yuwwi I got’da— I usi’m— Yuwwi I got’da usi’m a—“

“Hey, Monika, it’s okay—“

_“T-Toyyy’wit!”_

You know what? Monika will deal with the burning embarrassment of how she can’t even pronounce the word, much less how she’s in tears over it, _later._ Right now, she’s going to deal with the burning pain of _having to use the toilet,_ which she is going to do, even if it takes her a _trillion_ years to stand up and _toddle,_ because of course, out of the playroom. She says a trillion years because her legs aren’t very good at walking at the moment, for many reasons, and because Yuri looks like she’s about to pluck Monika up _anyway_ before Monika trips a little bit over absolutely nothing but her own dumb two-year-old feet and it isn’t a _long_ fall, and it’s onto Turtle, who’s soft and cushion-like, but it’s a _jostly_ fall and—

_Oh no,_

Nothing happens, perhaps just because of how every single tiny muscle in Monika’s body curls inwards, but she lets out a choking sob anyway and, yes, _now_ Yuri picks her up.

“I’d have to hold you,” is all she says, very quiet, and Monika _cries._

_”No!”_

_”Not_ because I think you’re a baby, Monika,” Yuri continues, firmly - “Because, _physically,_ you are tiny. It would be irresponsible for me to leave you alone.”

_”I e-e’ponnsibuw!”_ Monika wails, stock-still only from fear of what might happen if she moved too much, and Yuri squeezes her shoulders gently.

“You can also drown in an inch of water, Monika,”

Monika doesn’t have any rebuttals to that besides a whimpering _whine_ that grabs two fistfuls of Yuri’s heartstrings and yanks down, down, down,

“Y-Yu-uwwi, i’h— _hu-w-wwts—“_

All the way _down_ until sobs taper to drowsy sniffles, warm hand brushing softly against Monika’s teary cheek until drowsy sniffles are deep, even breaths against Yuri’s sweater and gentle heartbeat - tiny body rigid, trembling where it lays against Yuri.

Yuri’s heart pangs, _sharply,_ but after a moment of thought - soft breath - she raises her other hand to the back of Monika’s head, and rubs gently as the tiny girl, fast asleep, sucks the tip of Yuri’s finger into her mouth.

* * *

Monika stirs, a little, tilting her head absently and feeling her cheek brush against some soft material. Sleepy, and warm, and being gently bumped, she feels a very strong urge to just drift back into her nap; suckling absentmindedly at whatever had ended up between her lips, drowsily regarding how... loose she felt. Soft, in her shoulders and neck and head, and back, and she thinks it has something to do with the fingertips gently and firmly massaging their way down her body. She’s not complaining - quite the opposite, really, and she sighs and snuffles contentedly around her mystery mouth object. It’s good, whatever it is; it’s good and so is the rubbing, and the warmth, and how she’s cradled, and she’s vaguely hoping that her legs get the same treatment, too, because they’re stiff and tense for a reason she can’t fathom.

Then there’s hushing, and sweet murmurs, and Monika’s nap is calling and she’d really hate to keep it waiting, even as something very small in the back of her head whimpers as the nice, gentle, relaxing hand moves towards her tummy.

* * *

Monika does not wake up in the playroom.

Monika wakes up, loose-limbed and disoriented and... soft? Soft, she concludes - soft as in the blanket wrapped snugly around her, and soft as in relaxed and cozy and drowsily considering never moving again. Which she might not have to do, actually - as soon as she sniffs in waking, Sayori turns her head and gently nuzzles the side of Monika’s face, shifting the small girl’s position just enough to be comfortable again. Monika doesn’t know how she could possibly have known how to do that, but she’s pleased and warm and, upon spotting Turtle nestled in Sayori’s lap beside her, so _dumbly_ happy that a wide smile paints across her face and she wiggles her feet as she gives an excited suck on h—

On—

_Nope!_ No! No, that was quite enough of whatever was going on there, no, nein, no no nope nuh-uh no, and Monika spits out the pacifier in her mouth with as much force as she can possibly manage. Sayori, at least, gets the hint - leaves it where it dropped to the ground and tucks Monika a little closer, nudging Turtle towards her.

“Sorry, Mons,” she says, a little absentmindedly as her pen scratches away at a notebook somewhere above Monika, on a desk, “Your hands were all wrapped up, and...”

_Sayori_ apologized. _Sayori_ was nice about this whole ordeal. Monika huffs lightly, pulling her hands free from the blanket and grasping at her tortoise plush.

_”Don’_ ‘tuck my t’umb,” Monika insists, moodily. Sayori ruffles her hair.

“Mmhm. You don’t.”

Monika knows Sayori’s not telling the truth, but she feels satisfied anyway. She decides to busy herself with running her hand along the tortoise’s soft shell, half-listening to the scratch-scratch-scratch of Sayori’s pen and her idle hums, leaning into the peach-haired girl’s hand as it reaches down to play with an errant lock of Monika’s hair.

It isn’t until dinner - in two _hours_ \- that Monika remembers the circumstances under which she took her impromptu nap, and though she’d like to believe very much that absolutely nothing had occurred during such ~~(because she was _dry_ but she didn’t _hurt)_~~ ,

She knows, from Yuri’s guilty expression over the dinner table, that isn’t exactly true.

_”Some-body’s_ in the _dog-house,”_ Natsuki snickers over a plate of rice, and Monika decides to be moody and two just long enough to chuck a plastic fork at her head.


	6. Chapter 6

“... wwi...”

“Ehn?”

“... uwwi... Y-Yuw— Yuw— Yu... _w—_ nghhhh.”

Natsuki stays where she was standing in the hall, tilting her head curiously towards the slightly-open playroom door. Yuri had (tiredly) announced earlier that Monika had fallen asleep in there - how, Natsuki isn’t exactly certain, but that’s just another random mystical power that babies possessed, she supposes - and proceeded, _very_ responsibly, to pass the fuck out in her own room across the hall. So, clearly, Natsuki had decided that in Sayori’s physical absence (ah, school) and in Yuri’s _mental_ absence, she would keep an ear on the playroom so little miss totally-not-a-baby wouldn’t... wake up and eat a LEGO, or something. Whatever it was that babies were supposed to do when they were alone. Not that Monika really did any of that stuff, anyway - she glued herself to Sayori’s hip whenever she was home, sometimes toddled around annoyedly behind Yuri when she wasn’t, and left entirely to her own devices, would usually sit in one spot and miserably pat that turtle toy.

Which was kinda depressing to watch, honestly. Not that Natsuki would have enjoyed being accidentally supergod-power-incontinence’d into a little kid, herself, but she’d probably at _least_ live it up a _little._ Bounce on the couch once or twice, watch some kid show she couldn’t be caught dead watching at eighteen, get into the cookies and make a mess, color a wall - whatever. You get the point. Something... you know, _fun._ Even, like, yelling just for the hell of it. Natsuki wondered if Monika even _realized_ she could do that kind of stuff now, or if she was too busy mourning coffee and driving to care.

“... ‘owi. Sa— Say’— Say’ow, wi... Say’ow— o _ww,_ o— _w—_ uuuuwwhhh...”

... okay, yeah, that... didn’t _sound_ like sleeping-baby-babble. Monika was definitely awake in there. Didn’t make a fuss, or anything, but awake all the same. What the hell is she even doing?

“... N... Nhhu...”

... wait a second.

Oh, she’s trying to pronounce their _names._ Hah. Natsuki has noticed, from Monika’s many irate speeches about why she doesn’t need any one of the things she has one hundred percent ended up needing - and also from her whimpering for Sayori, of course - that said spitfire toddler has a speech affect a mile wide. Maybe it wouldn’t be as noticeable if she didn’t constantly try to pronounce words like, let’s see, “educational” and “nutritional” and... was it “responsible” or “irresponsible”? The fact she couldn’t tell probably said all that needed to be said. Needless to say, she’d probably have better luck if she stuck to kid words, but Monika was Monika and a super stubborn brat no matter how drastic the height change.

“... Nhhha. N— Naaa... Nat’u— N— Nasshu... Na... Nasssuhugi...”

_Oh, no wonder the little devil hadn’t been saying her name._

Natsuki considers, _very_ carefully, whether it would totally be worth it to rib her about it.

“... N... Nat’u— Na— Naaasshuuw... uuu... h-huuu...”

... oh. Ah, that is no longer pronouncing, and the telltale noise of whimpering sort of makes the will to tease Monika wilt away in Natsuki’s chest. Oh, well. _Probably,_ she admits to nobody but herself, for the better.

“Hey, shortie, what’s eatin’ ya?”

Monika, who - oh my god - had been curled up on the belly of the ridiculous oversized stuffed bear in the corner of the room, freezes as Natsuki pokes her head through the doorway, fiddling with the dimmer to coax some light into the room.

“...”

Ah, silence. Monika probably figured out that if Natsuki had been close enough to hear whimpering, she’d be close enough to hear Speech Therapy 101. Undeterred, and with the light at a reasonably visible setting, Natsuki strides over to the bear and _flops_ down next to it, lazily stretching an arm across the fur above Monika’s head.

“C’mon, Mon. We all know you’re not mute.”

“...”

And _that_ just made the girl curl her arms over her face, rolling slightly away from her. Sigh. Natsuki is about to launch into a ‘oh come on, it’s not even that embarrassing, you saw _high Sayori_ more than a few times a couple months back and now _that’s_ embarrassing,’

... but.

You know something?

Whenever Yuri pulled that crap with her - because she _did,_ she was like a fucking mother hen once the Lit Club managed to extract her from her shell - it didn’t make Natsuki feel even a _lick_ better. Honestly, it was kind of insulting. When Natsuki was pissed off, or embarrassed, or sad about something - then god damn it, she _was!_ Even if someone else decided that was dumb, airing that to the world didn’t make her feel _better._ It was just— infuriating. Infuriating, and belittling, and being a toddler is probably infuriating and belittling enough.

“... yeah, okay. I get it.”

Monika stiffens slightly in surprise, chancing a very small peek through her arms at Natsuki.

“If you don’t wanna talk, you don’t gotta. I’m smart, you’re smart as fuck - still just you under all that, ain’t it? Just Monika, same as always. Don’t wanna talk, then we can like, point, nod, tug on my leg or whatever. It’s cool,” Natsuki continues, giving Monika’s leg the same jovial kind of pat she does Sayori and Yuri. “Okay?”

“...”

Monika... nods, slowly, and pulls her hands away from her face. Natsuki, who is _totally_ not feeling a giant swell of pride right now, just grins her usual grin.

“Nice. C’mon, this stuff’s boring, right?”

Monika blinks. Natsuki indicates the general baby nonsense in the room with a tilt of the head.

“Blocks and pull-ducks and all that. Noticed you’re not really interested. And that’s fair, right? You’re, like, you. Just kinda short. Not fair to expect you to suddenly like block towers and farm animals, yeah?”

Monika, who is now sitting up, _nods._ Natsuki folds her arms, nodding back.

“That’s what I thought. How about you and me go downstairs and do something _actually_ fun, then?”

Oh, that’s the _mother_ of all nods. That’s bobblehead nodding. _Take that, Yuri,_ Natsuki thinks, humming a note of approval.

“Sweet! You wanna walk yourself, or do you want me t’ getcha down?”

There is a moment of hesitation from Monika - which, well, is fair -

(But Natsuki doesn’t see the reason she expected, in Monika’s expression.)

“I wouldn’t mind,” Natsuki finds herself saying before she realizes she’s speaking, “’m _way_ stronger than I look. Won’t drop you or nothin’, swear to it.”

She’s not totally sure if she’s just imagining it, but the way Monika curls her arms around Natsuki’s neck seems... content.

* * *

“Well, if you don’t want any, I’m gonna have ‘em,” Natsuki asserts, referring to the package of Oreos she has completely lawfully procured from the upper cabinets in the kitchen, mostly through casually hopping up onto the counter for the extra height - “Ain’t nobody stopping us!”

You’d think the kid never had fun before in her _life!_

That couldn’t be right, though. Taller-Monika did things with the club all the time. At some point, she _had_ to have come into contact with the idea of:

• cookies before dinner,

• cartoons on Tuesday afternoon,

• and jumping on the damn couch?

Well, okay - that last one wasn’t Natsuki’s idea _or_ doing. It had just sort of happened, probably because of the sugar spike and the super-sized battle in _Dragon Drive_ (which was _not_ a show for babies, Natsuki proudly explained, it was a kickass show for people with _good taste),_ and Natsuki had to admit that Monika had looked nothing short of absolutely overjoyed to be doing it - granted, the bounces were more like little rhythmic tip-toes into the couch, since Monika’s legs were still getting the hang of remembering basic locomotion, and she was hanging onto Natsuki’s shoulder to do it, but _still_ \- happy bouncing, and it was fucking _cute as hell._

Which is why it was really surprising to see her stop so suddenly.

Yuri definitely had not woken up - Natsuki was certain that the undead could only arise after the accursed sun had faded from the skies, and it was, like, barely 4 pm - and it wasn’t even like there was suddenly exposition happening, or anything. Monika had just gone pale, and sat down, and looked at the suddenly very interesting floor like some kind of happy-switch in her had just been unceremoniously flicked off.

... or...

... no. Natsuki finds herself physically shaking her head, no, to herself. Embarrassment hung around Monika like a fun-ruining black stormcloud in her current form - no doubt, one of its nasty bolts of “wow you look dumb” lightning had nipped her in the ass. Natsuki would really love to get those black clouds to fuck off, truth be told. Monika’s got enough stress in her life as it is, even as a half-pint of chocolate milk rather than the grande triple-shot Americano she typically was, never mind the weirdly involved drink-based metaphor.

“Hey, Monika,” she says, glancing back towards the television, “You know what this whole thing reminds me of?”

This successfully brings Monika’s attention away from the ground, and Natsuki smiles - less mushy, more mischievous - and she points to a dragon, chibi-moded, onscreen.

“You’re totally like a dragon right now,” she continues, “Or, like— a Digimon, or a god from that one series. You got this big, super-strong super-form, but you’re all tired out and _bam!_ Convenient, portable lil’ chill-out form, chargin’ up all your awesome might ‘till the next time ya need i— heyyy! Aw, c’mon, what gives,”

Monika, though in the process of whacking Natsuki (completely ineffectually) on the arm...

... is giggling, cheeks dusted with pink.

“Ohh, _I_ get it. You’re goin’ in for a practice spar! Well, _Chibika,_ let it be known that I don’t go easy on chibi dragons—!”

* * *

Yuri can be forgiven for not being entirely sure where she’s woken up, considering the squealing laughter, the senseless noise, and, upon wandering down the stairs, the ridiculous quantity of cookie crumbs.

_”Cookies?”_

Yuri, arms crossed and mother-hen look in full force, can be quite intimidating to anybody who isn’t Natsuki.

(Natsuki really, _really_ doesn’t like the way Monika freezes stiffly in her lap, and she slides her arms around her - quite visible, quite warmly, and just tight enough.)

“She’s _Monika,”_ replies Natsuki, “And Oreos aren’t gonna kill her, _mother duck._ Neither,” she sniffs, “Is a little fun.”

... and Yuri sighs, shoulders dropping, glancing to the side.

“... you’re probably right,” she says, “But both of you better finish dinner tonight, alright?”

“We will! Scout’s honor, right, Monika?”

“‘C— ‘Cout annow,” says Monika - the first real vocalization she’s made beyond delighted giggles and _really adorable_ growly dragon noises in more than three hours - and Natsuki feels like the most important damn person in the entire _world_ when the squirt wiggles to her feet and puts her arms around Natsuki’s neck without any prodding.

“... u-up, p’ease,” Monika mumbles - cheek warm where it’s pressed against Natsuki - and Natsuki, not a drop of hesitation in her bones, wraps her arms around Monika in turn.

“Yup, I gotcha,” Natsuki assures - “Where to, Chibika?”

(Monika beams so brightly at the nickname, Natsuki’s certain that the _sun_ could go out at this moment and she’d never be the wiser.)


	7. Chapter 7

_... raspberry?_

* * *

Natsuki gave Monika a popsicle late yesterday afternoon, because it was the first day of summer vacation, very warm outside, and “popsicles are a very important block of the dark food pyramid,” according to Natsuki. Natsuki, an accomplished adult purveyor of iced treats, had managed to eat her strawberry pop with only a sticky chin and hands.

Monika, however, had ended up looking like a neon blue-raspberry explosion. Which was fair, really, because she’s only tw— because her hands and mouth and general hand-eye coordination are around two years old, and since Natsuki had insisted on shucking Monika’s shirt beforehand anyway, little harm came to any clothing.

“Eiii, c’mon, don’t lick your hands!” Said Natsuki, who was in the process of licking off her _own_ fingers - and it was Monika’s delighted laughter that had summoned Sayori, grins and gentle hands on hips, to the front porch with a little gleam in her eye.

_”Someone_ looks like they need a bath!”

...

Monika was less upset about the bath than she thought she would be, much like how she was less upset about being covered in sticky itchy sugar syrup than she thought she would be. Well - _logically,_ she guesses, there shouldn’t be any problem anyway, right? It’s not like Monika hasn’t taken baths in the vicinity of Sayori before, and bubble baths were nice, no matter how old you were supposed to be. And Monika is certain that her fascination with the small plastic boat, duck, turtle and diver that ended up in the tub somehow is entirely, naturally, because things look rather different from a closer point of view. It’s a lot easier for her to notice little details, like the painted planks on the side of the boat, or the weathering on the turtle’s shell, or how the duck and diver are best friends with the turtle, who has to live on the boat because he can’t swim in the water. She’s interested in the details, and that’s the _only_ reason she gets fussy when Sayori starts to take a very soft washcloth to her face.

The rest of washing is fine, though. Monika barely pays attention to it, since it’s not like the washcloth is particularly interesting, and even though she frowns a little when Sayori lays her back, it turns out that hair-washing is absolutely the best part of having a bath ever. She might have felt embarrassed when her response to Sayori’s “all done!” was a very hopeful “again?”, but Sayori just smiles in her very sunshiney way and tells Monika that she’ll brush her hair before bedtime, which is even better as far as Monika is concerned so of course she grins.

Sayori ‘hup!’s her out of the bath a moment or so after a faint beep from another room, and someone tall who must be Yuri passes Sayori a towel that is so _ridiculously_ soft and sweet-smelling and _warm_ that Monika can’t find it in her to care about what Sayori is dressing her bottom in, nor that the hooded towel looks like a duckling and not a turtle.

Monika also doesn’t mind that Sayori carries her for much longer than just walking down the stairs. The towel is fluffy enough that it might as well be a blanket, and Sayori’s natural heat is more than enough to warm Monika, especially when Monika is burrowed so close to her. Sayori carries her for a _lot._ She carries her downstairs, and carries her through helping Yuri put away clean dishes. She carries her through a quiet conversation with Natsuki that Monika doesn’t listen to, because Sayori’s heartbeat and breathing is nicer, and she carries her back upstairs where she sits on her bed and cradles Monika close and buries her nose in Monika’s soft clean hair with a hum, which Monika _loves,_ having Mama so close and so happy and so warm, and she kisses Monika on the forehead and nose and on her cheeks - giggles softly as she tugs the corner of the towel from Monika’s mouth and presses a pacifier past her lips instead, and puts her in her cozy pajamas, and lays Monika in bed with her head cushioned on Turtle just how she likes it, and lays next to her with one arm over and curling behind her, safe, just how she likes it, and Monika’s last sleepy thoughts before her eyes flutter shut is that Mama must be the very best person in the whole world.

...

Monika doesn’t wake up in bed, again, but that’s probably fine - she’s pretty sure she fell asleep while Sayori was carrying her yesterday, anyway, so that’s just two for count.

“Good dreams, Monnie?” Sayori asks, beaming at Monika in her lap - apparently, Monika wakes up around when everyone is having breakfast, which works out okay enough.

“Yuh-huh,” Monika nods, and yawns, and elects not to tell Sayori that it had involved her feeding Monika with a _turtle bottle._ Honestly, there’s just some things Monika doesn’t want to deal with in the mornings.

Unlike Sayori’s oatmeal. She does want to deal with Sayori’s oatmeal, because it looks tasty and if Sayori is eating it, it _has_ to be tasty. Even if she has to use the same spoon Sayori’s using (which is fine, they did that with ice cream before, it’s normal), and even if Sayori has to hold the spoon.

...

Yuri has deemed Monika ‘adventurous’ today, which is kind of silly, considering all she’s doing is wandering around the lower story of a house she pretty much already knows like the back of her hand anyway. Except for things like Natsuki’s room, which she thinks used to be a closet, before Monika was tiny and it was Natsuki’s room; very pink, with a lot of tv show posters, and numbered books, and one Natsuki playing a video game in a beanbag chair, which Monika leans against and watches for awhile, because she likes being with Natsuki and she likes the game, she thinks. It’s bright and colorful and changes a lot and it’s interesting, but eventually she decides that if Natsuki’s room was new, there must be other new rooms, so she picks up Turtle and wanders off again.

The closet moved places, Monika discovers, and so did the bathroom; neither of these places are very interesting and the bathroom floor is _very_ cold to bare feet, so Monika leaves them alone and wanders back out to the big room in the middle,

Where she sees something up on the table.

Her first thought is _it’s blue!_ which it is, and blue is a color she really likes, because it’s like Sayori’s eyes and Turtle’s shell and popsicles, which are all things she really likes. Her second thought is that it kind of looks like a popsicle, which doesn’t make sense at first, because it’s warm inside and popsicles go _outside_ \- but she bumps the table a little as she wanders closer, and the blue sloshes, and Monika realizes it’s _drink_ and not hard. She remembers that warm popsicles get soft and turn into drink, and her mouth waters a little and wets her chin because she also remembers that raspberry popsicles are tasty and sweet and _blue,_ and the fact that this drink-raspberry-popsicle was up taller than she was doesn’t bother her very much, because she’s clever and knows that the easiest way to reach the table-top is by climbing up on a chair, of which there are multitudes.

Once she’s up taller, on a chair, she can see that the drink popsicle is in a cup with a lid, and she tilts her head slightly before deciding that she can probably take off the lid, since she’s smart and two whole years old - and she can definitely _reach_ the cup with no problems, but the lid doesn’t come off when she pulls, and she even pulls hard enough to hit her hand on the weird top part of it when she loses her grip. And it stings. And she’s starting to _twist_ on the lid in huffy frustration (feeling very proud of herself when it wiggles a little bit) when she takes another glaring look at the painful weird tall stuck lid and

_Jesus Christ it’s a bottle of fucking Windex._

Monika’s heart very nearly leaps entirely out of her throat, along with her breakfast, and she _throws_ the plastic bottle of _chemical window cleaner_ to the floor,

And the loud clatter, along with the stinging little scrape on her hand and the _absolute abject horror of what she very nearly just **drank,**_ leaves Monika on her rear in the chair, clutching her toy and wailing.

Like a two-year-old.

“Monika? Monika— oh, Monika, what’s wrong? Shh, shh, come here... oh, Monika...”

She doesn’t even care that Yuri is baby-talking her. She doesn’t even care that she’s being bounced like some baby, doesn’t care that Yuri is cradling her protectively into her shoulder like there was anything out to get Monika besides her own absolute idiocy - doesn’t care that the bouncing and the shushing and the warm carry _is_ making her feel better, like she was safe and there was nothing to worry about anymore, even though _there absolutely was_ and Yuri was not a magic band-aid for her problems, even if her hand felt so much less hurty after Yuri gently rubs her own thumb over it. Even if everything felt so much less scary with Yuri holding her, Yuri nearby.

~~Yuri wouldn’t let Monika drink something like that.~~

~~(mommies don’t let their babies drink yucky things.)~~

“Shh... there we go. It’s okay, Monika, I’m right here.” Yuri soothes, Monika’s tiny face buried in her shoulder, small body shivering with hiccups and tiny cries that make Yuri feel a whole lot like holding her for the rest of eternity and maybe then a little more, to be on the safe side. _... of course, that’s the natural reaction most people have to small children,_ she sighs, rubbing little circles into Monika’s back and glancing around for whatever might have scared her so much. Perhaps whatever had fallen...

... that bottle? There didn’t seem to be anything else on the ground. Yuri wonders how it even _got_ all the way over there - she’d seen Sayori put it down this morning, somewhat in a rush to take another try at dissecting the current fabric of the universe, and... well, clearly she hadn’t come back down to put it away, yet, because there it lay on the floor. Knocked... off of the table.

Monika had knocked it off the table?

They certainly didn’t have a _cat,_ and Natsuki was just as engrossed in her puzzle game as she had been all morning - Monika was, therefore, the only other person even available to be shoving objects around. Why on Earth had she pushed it?

_Testing to see if gravity still worked?_

Yuri bends, knees-first, to pick up the fallen bottle...

... and freezes when she sees it leaking around its partially-unscrewed cap.

“S-S-So-oww-wyyy, Y-Yuw-wi, s-sow-ww-yyyy,”

...

Monika raises no fuss, no protest, no opposition to Yuri’s worried check of her mouth - no comment, no grousing when Yuri re-tightens the cap of the Windex bottle and places it _far_ out of reach, nearly too tall for six-foot-two _Yuri_ to grab.

Monika doesn’t even complain when Yuri delivers her upstairs to Sayori, tells Sayori not to leave dangerous things out where little ones can reach and she doesn’t even frown at _that._ She burrows into Sayori’s arms, and feels sorry and bad that Sayori is being scolded for something that _Monika_ did, and when Yuri leaves the room again Monika looks up at Sayori, face crumpled with a million awful feelings and eyes blurry and hot with new tears, and can’t manage to say anything besides

“N... N-not— n-ot’ta-a, b- _ba-aby,”_

And Sayori gathers her to her chest, tucks Monika’s head under her chin in that warmest, safest place, curls her arms around her wholly and murmurs _”of course not,”_ and Monika cries until Sayori’s heart lulls her somewhere where everything is warmth, and Turtle’s softness, and Sayori’s humming and closeness and peach-sunshine-love scent - somewhere Monika doesn’t feel sad and scared anymore.


	8. Chapter 8

Monika isn’t hungry when she wakes up.

Monika isn’t really _anything_ when she wakes up, unless you count too warm and sticky and dizzy. Monika is also in bed when she wakes up, which is dully surprising until she sits up on trembling hands to read the digital clock on Sayori’s nightstand.

4:07 am.

That’s why she woke up in bed; because Sayori is fast asleep, because it’s much too early to be awake at all - but Monika is anyway, squinting blearily into the dark room and clumsily sticking her own palm to her forehead.

She’s _sick._

Sayori told her over and over that she was going to get sick if she stuck her hands in her mouth, and now look at that. Ta-da. Sick. Monika’s realizing a little too late that if her body is so small, her immune system must have gone down along with it.

_Sick._

She can’t be sick.

She can’t be sick as a _toddler,_ not after Sayori already warned her about it; toddlers got sick in a _disgusting_ way, with puking and crying and _other things_ and snot-nose-spit-mouths and needy needy _needy,_ all day long, all night long, and Monika can’t _do_ that. Not to her friends. Not to her friends who were already going much, much too far out of their way to accommodate tiny, weak, helpless, useless, Monika.

Nobody needed that. _Nobody_ needed a gross baby.

Monika sits and thinks.

Usually, when she’s sick - and also a few feet taller - she just... stays out of people’s way, until she’s not sick anymore. It worked fine enough. She— she could take care of herself. She just had to lay down in one place, and find water somewhere, and sleep until things took care of themselves and she could go back to school again. Perfect and quiet and no fuss made.

Of course, that was when she had... her own room. And a separate house. And nobody particularly concerned about her wellbeing. ~~why is anybody concerned about my w~~ So this would be slightly more difficult than then, yes, but definitely for the better. If they didn’t want to deal with a useless baby _before,_ they wouldn’t want to deal with a useless baby _after_ it spends several days being disgusting.

So all she had to do was...

... get out of bed...

... at four in the morning, over Sayori, and toddle somewhere to hide, in the dark. Upstairs. Alone.

She may be coming down with an illness, but Monika is neither stupid, nor suicidal - that plan wouldn’t work for even a second. In fact, she thinks worriedly, Sayori looks a little more awake than she had a minute ago, and Monika lays back down on Turt— plush toy, shuts her eyes.

It’s fine. This is fine. She’ll wait until Sayori wakes up for real, in the morning, and then she’ll ‘wake up’ right when Sayori finishes walking downstairs with her, and then once Sayori wanders off to get something, Monika will find someplace to hide. There. That plan is much, much better, not least because Sayori’s breathing evens out again in sleep once Monika is back in her lay-down spot.

Besides, she’s sick. Monika _always_ finds it harder to sleep when she’s sick.

...

Monika wakes up from a dead sleep in Sayori’s lap, at the kitchen table, and suppresses the urge to sigh.

“Aw, there’s our lil’ sunshine~!” Sayori chirps, cheerful as always, and Monika just shuts her eyes for a moment. _Way_ too bright. Bright, and noisy, and— uggghhh, the smell of breakfast was just making her nauseous. Last night she’d been hopeful that this wouldn’t _really_ be so bad, but that doesn’t seem like it would be the case.

“Someone’s a little grumpy this morning, huh?” Sayori says, and Monika realizes a bit too late that she’s frowning. “Natsuki made some eggs for you, Monnie, are you hungry?”

_No._ Monika is not hungry, and Monika is also silently thanking her own sleep schedule that she’d dozed off before dinner last night. It was much, _much_ easier to stop throw-up on an empty stomach. Vomit. Easier to not vomit.

Monika doesn’t want to speak, though - what if her voice is croaky? - and so instead, she simply balls her fists to rub her eyes, turning away from Sayori’s offering fork with tight lips.

“Ohh, I see. Still sleepy, huh, muffin,” hums Sayori, and Monika barely notices the pet name until it’s too late to dispute it - silently, somehow, and she’s just going to have to accept it and hope that wasn’t suddenly weird. Maybe nobody would notice? Maybe today nobody would be very observant.

“Your cheeks are looking a little red, darling...”

Nope. Yuri. At least she feels her face warm even further at the _name,_ and she hopes _fervently_ that Yuri brushes this whole thing off as embarrassment,

“Yeah, she’s a little warm, too.”

_Darn it, Sayori._

“Jeez, guys, lay off her. She’s all warm from sleepin’ in Sayori’s freaky-cozy bed all night,” Natsuki grunts. “And y’all know she doesn’t like those mushy baby names.”

Praise be Natsuki. Monika looks over at her gratefully, which she doesn’t exactly notice because her face is buried in eggs and toast and orange juice and other things, but Monika hopes she got the message anyway. She probably did. She’s good like that. Monika has no idea that she’s spacing out in the pink-haired girl’s general direction until Sayori turns her around, gently, to fix her with the most strangely intense... _new,_ and... and weird and sort of, unsettling, and not unsettling, look that Monika has never seen before in her life.

“... Natsuki, are— are you _sure?_ Yuri? Yuri, does she smell sick to you?”

_What._

No, no that’s— mm. Nope. That is the sweet sound of Monika taking an immediate rain check from this non-conversation. She has no idea what’s worse - Sayori saying that not only with a straight face, but with a _serious_ face, or Yuri looking _thoughtful_ and drawing closer.

“I’m... not sure? Here, Sayori, pass her to me for a moment,”

_No thanks! No weird uncomfy scary-keen mommy hold-smelling today!_

“N—Na’kiiiiiiiiiii!”

_”_ _Guys!_ Leave Monika _alone,_ you’re both _seriously_ freaking her out!” Natsuki snaps, to Sayori and Yuri’s collective and sudden surprise. “She’s _right there!_ Quit talkin’ nonsense over her head and just ask her!”

“O-Oh,” Yuri clears her throat, “... right.”

“Sorry, Monnie,” Sayori apologizes, very sincerely. “I’m... I’m just worried, and I got ahead of myself. Are you feeling sick?”

Sayori...

... really does look worried...

... ~~probably because she doesn’t want to clean up baby puke, stupid.~~

“Uh-uh,” Monika mumbles, shaking her head, and Sayori’s expression softens only slightly.

...

Monika had only escaped for 5 minutes, give or take, before she was starting to regret it - not _least_ because Sayori had finally taken her eyes off of her with a gentle and firm “stay here, okay?” that Monika had immediately, sickly, disobeyed.

One of the very few pros of being a sick toddler, she thinks, is the hiding places.

She definitely found somewhere perfect to hide - a tiny nook in the very, very back of the hallway closet, thoroughly hidden by clutter and hung-up clothes. It was dark, and it was quiet, and it was very very well hidden, and she might have felt a little better if she wasn’t exhausted and sick and guilty.

(Not guilty. She was saving Sayori and Yuri and even Natsuki the gigantic horrible trouble of having to deal with something so useless and awful.)

Monika breathes out shakily, and tries not to think about her twisting stomach, and presses her cheek against the cold hardwood floor, and falls asleep after only two forevers and a half.

...

Monika’s tummy hurts.

She wakes up in a daze, somewhere dark, radiating heat and sniffling through tears she didn’t remember making. She remembers that she’s hiding from M— Sayori, and Yuri, and Natsuki, a bare instant before her stomach boils in the _worst_ way and her breath hitches in panic, _panic,_ and she thought she could be an _adult_ and bite her tongue and swallow it back but she can’t, and she vomits.

Which is a lot worse when you’re laying down, on your side, in the dark.

Monika didn’t even think she had anything to throw up at all until right now, shaking and gagging and she can’t see anything in the dark but she smells something like _spoiled milk,_ and she hiccups and choke-splutters quietly and wonders if the whole world was laughing at her right now because she never even drank any milk. She hadn’t eaten or drank _anything,_ and she was puking up milk anyway like a stupid gross baby, and it smelled _awful_ but she couldn’t move more than an inch or two away from her gross mess and it was still gross in her mouth and stinging on her chin and she cries as quietly as she _possibly_ can, and her tummy hurts, hurts, hurts.

Monika whimpers, until she is asleep again.

...

Monika wakes up in an even worse way than she fell asleep.

She hates remembering that she can’t wear underwear, that she has to wear something _else,_ and— and she’s always asleep, she thinks, when things happen, because things don’t happen when she’s awake. Yuri _always_ rocks her to sleep so she doesn’t have to think about it, but now Monika is all alone, so nobody else has to deal with all her icky grossness, which means Monika wakes up sick and throw-up-mouthed and _soggy,_ and _hurting,_ and smelling well and truly _disgusting_ so so much that her tummy twists and gurgles and she throws up again, but it’s thin and stinging and she tries so hard to _not_ that she throws up through her _nose,_ and _everything hurts so much._

So much, so much, so much. Everything hurts. Her bottom hurts and her front hurts and her body hurts and her tummy hurts and her nose hurts and her mouth hurts and her head hurts and her throat hurts and her eyes hurt, and everything hurts, and she can’t cry for M— M— S-Say— Ma— even if she _wanted_ to because the most loudest, and most horribly hurty noise she can possibly make is a tiny weak gurgle through icky spitty throw-up lips.

She finally realizes that she didn’t remember to bring Turtle with her, and the twinge of relief that she didn’t make him all gross and messy too is far and away drowned by hopeless loneliness.

Monika slips into sleep again somewhere in foggy, wishing thoughts of Turtle, and softness, and dryness, and no more alone.

...

Monnie doesn’t know where she is.

It’s _dark,_ and she’s scared, because she thought she opened her eyes and you’re supposed to be able to see when you open your eyes, but she can’t see anything. It’s dark, and it’s _smelly,_ and it’s hard to breathe - there’s icky all in her mouth and her nose, and she wheezes weakly where she lays on something hot but cold but hot, and slippery. She kicks, a tiny bit, but moving her legs and her bottom _hurts,_ and it feels so _icky and dirty and bad_ that she stops with another wheeze.

She feels so yucky. She feels so yucky, and so dirty, and she doesn’t know why she’s all alone. Did she do something bad? She must have done something bad again, because she can’t feel anybody near her at all, nobody but her in this awful icky place. Monnie did something bad so she has to be all alone.

She whimpers.

She wants Turtle.

_(“... i? He... in... ?”)_   
_(“Sh... omew... ere...”)_

... somebody... ?

Monnie whimpers again, hitting her arm weakly against the ground. Did she hear something? Is there somebody who can hear her? Are they going to come help her? She knows she’s all alone because she was _bad_ and that nobody is supposed to come help her but she wishes somebody comes anyway. She’s sorry, she’s sorry for being bad, she’s sorry and she can’t move and she wants to sleep again but she wants... she... she wants...

_(“... ri! Sa... ri, sh... ere,”)_   
_(“... ure—? O— **Ohhh—** ”)_

... mama? Mama? That’s Mama, that’s Mama’s voice, blurry and soft but that’s Mama’s voice and Monnie remembers Mama, Monnie remembers Mama’s happy voice and gentle heartbeat and safe arms and sweet smell and Monnie,

wants,

_Mama,_

And the tiny voice inside of her that tells her it’s too scary to yell is sick and sleepy and doesn’t say anything, so Monnie wheezes in a breath and closes her eyes again and lets out a long, painful, scared, sobbing, **noise,** and she doesn’t stop until she feels gentle hands and hears gasps and shushing and _Mama,_ and even though her tummy spits up more icky when she goes up in the air so suddenly, Mama doesn’t let go of her.

...

Monnie feels like she’s asleep, but she’s awake.

She thinks. Maybe she _is_ asleep. She feels fuzzy and floaty, like she does when she’s asleep - Mama’s face is blurry and everybody’s words are far away and slow. But she never sleeps this long, and never hurting so much. All her feelings are still awake, even if she’s not.

Sometimes she whimpers because her feelings are awake, and hurting her. And then she’s even less sure if she’s sleeping or if she’s awake, because then she sees Mommy and the ouches go away - Mommy sings and Mommy rubs her arms and legs and achy chest and when Monnie feels yucky and dirty, Mommy fixes it so Monnie is clean again.

Mama lays with Monnie always, in the soft nest, and she doesn’t go away. Mama is right next to Monnie, so if Monnie tilts her head, she can bury herself in Mama’s soft and heartbeat and love-smell without having to move to her, which is good, because Monnie doesn’t think she can move right now. She’s too asleep, and too hurting. But Mama is here, and she’s making it better - Mama stays so close, and gives Monnie things to suck on like water and soft nubby things, and sucking on things makes Monnie feel sleepy and better. Mama put Turtle next to Monnie, too, and Monnie‘s hand is on his soft shell, and Turtle makes Monnie feel sleepy and better too, like sucking things, and Mama’s soft warm, and Mommy’s slow singing.

Monnie wants to feel better, but Monnie has to sleep, first.

(Monika has to sleep, first.)


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *posts nine chapters of a thing before realizing i haven't written one portion of it yet* Oops, Skipped The Cold Open Incident Of The Fic, Zoinks,
> 
> technically this should be and will be eventually chapter 10 i guess? deadass forgot i didn't finish ch 9 i cant believe

Yuri had known that _something_ would come forth.

“Oh, c’mon, Yu,” Natsuki scoffed, idly sweeping left-out crayons into their bin late one night, “You’re such a huge worrier. She’s drawing. She’s having a good time.”

“You went to therapy,” Yuri replies absently, crayon art held lightly between her fingers.

“Yeah, and? What, you think this is— play therapy, or something?”

“You held her at school...”

Natsuki doesn’t reply.

“... Natsuki, do you know what this is?” Is all Yuri says, a minute later - brow furrowed in thought. Natsuki considers making a smart remark, thinks just once before she speaks, and doesn’t.

“... kinda looks like a bird,” is what she says instead, shrugging. “Likes animals, doesn’t she?”

“Yes,” Yuri says, eyes scanning the black, jagged, spread-eagled and unnerving figure once more, “She does.”

...

Monika had, recently, been delighted by the discovery that Yuri would respond _anytime_ Monika said her name. Her favorite pastime by far, for the past week, had been following Yuri about the house and intermittently calling her name - doing nothing more than smiling excitedly, giggling, or saying _‘he’o’_ when Yuri turned to face her.

It was the most adorable phase Yuri had ever seen, and, if anything, it was almost _relieving._ Monika _should_ be seeking attention - it was healthy, natural, and in the interest of never repeating the curious (read: terrifying) incident of sickly Monika in the hallway closet, a necessity.

So Monika could have Yuri’s attention all she liked, when she liked, even how she liked, as long as she invited it.

Today is a rainy day, quiet and lazy - Sayori at work, Natsuki at school, Yuri daydreaming on the couch as Monika scribbles at the low table with crayon and paper. Sayori came home one afternoon with a big box of crayons, and Monika had been happily enamored with drawing since; as with all things, her coloring had grown rounder, outside the lines, as she relaxed.

So Monika is drawing, knees curled beneath her on Turtle’s trusty, plush-y shell. Yuri glances to her drawing every once in awhile, glances to colors. Green, and tan; purple and pink.

And black.

Yuri wonders if Monika even sees the black figure as she does, watching her scratch its form across the page. The sense of worry, nervousness, unsettlement is different in children and adults. For all she knows, it’s simply some imaginary thing...

“Yuwwi ‘ike pi’tshuw?”

Yuri blinks, looking down again - Monika standing at her idly crossed legs, smiling, paper in one hand, Turtle in the other.

“Oh, yes,” Yuri says, instantly, “You’re a lovely artist, Monnie.”

Monika beams, and wiggle-kicks her way onto the couch beside Yuri, who cranes her neck down slightly to appreciate the composition from a different angle.

A lion, clearly - four legs, tan body, and full _purple_ mane - stands over two small animals; a pink, pointy-eared cat, which seems to be wrapped around a very, very small green turtle, or at least the shell.

And, of course, the black... bird, towering in front of them all, glaring down.

_For all I know..._

Yuri hesitates, but asks anyway.

“What animal is this one, Monika?”

A slender finger points out the odd one; the menacing bird. Monika blinks.

“‘ssa haw... haw-k,” says Monika, nodding to herself at the end of her statement. Yuri hums a note of acknowledgement, and reaches an idle hand to card through Monika’s soft hair, and they sit for a moment before Monika takes a breath, funny and not quite even.

“Yuwwi?”

“Yes, Monika?”

Monika falls silent again, staring at the paper across her lap.

“Yuwwi?”

“Yes, Monnie?”

“Umh,” she starts - but only starts, mumbling lightly, leaning slowly back into Yuri’s hand. For a moment, she sucks on her own lower lip, eyes clouded.

“Yuwwi?”

“Yes, little one?”

“... somm’imes,” Monika says, after another moment of worried thought, “Somm’ime h, hawss d’op wi’ww tuw’tuwl... b-baby, onn’aw back, ‘n bwake t’em.”

“Do they?” Yuri asks, softly, and Monika bites on her own tiny fingertips and nods. “That’s not very nice of them, is it?”

“Nnuh,” Monika shakes her head, sucks her fingers further into her mouth. She isn’t looking at the drawing, or at Yuri, or anywhere, and Yuri keeps her voice quiet and gentle.

“Did anyone protect the baby turtle?”

Monika slowly shakes her head.

“That’s sad,” whispers Yuri. “That’s so sad. The baby turtle must have been so scared.”

A very slow nod.

“Does anyone protect the baby turtle now?”

Monika blinks, twice - the way she does when she stirs from sleep, thinking about whether to settle down again or not - and then, slowly, slowly, she looks at Yuri.

“Wion,” she mumbles, “an’ kiddy.”

Yuri smiles, soft and warm, and sits still to let Monika climb - slowly - into her lap. “That’s good,” murmurs Yuri, once Monika has settled herself in the place she wants to be. “That’s good. Babies need to be protected, don’t they? And loved.”

“... uh-huh.”

Monika nods against Yuri’s soft sweater - pushes her face in deep and clings, somehow looking smaller than she’d ever been - and Yuri, slowly, brings her arms around her.

Safely.

And that is where Monika falls asleep, early in the afternoon, as it rains.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> update: baby trauma edition
> 
> (i am so sorry)

_... I just_ — _I’m just really worried, ma’am, I think something’s_ _wrong_ _._

* * *

Sayori and Yuri first get an inkling that something is not right very, very early on.

Well - okay, there are a lot of things not-right about the way that Monika (currently a baby) acts, and it’s usually rather difficult to tell whether it’s owing to her being stubbornly _adult_ even through her very tiny form, or whether it’s owing to something... else. Precocious speech patterns; stubbornness. Odd drawings; ... something else. 

But Sayori has a _sinking_ feeling about this one, a sour intuition, and Yuri can’t help but agree; after all, a (once-adult) baby who tries not to cry as often as possible can easily be chalked up to stubborn pride - but a baby who stops crying after a handful of unanswered whines, shoulders sagging in defeat, can’t be brushed away as easily as that.

* * *

Monika hates being a _baby._

Well— _well—_ okay, okay. If she was being honest with herself, she didn’t hate... _everything,_ about being a baby. Being fed more than half the time was embarrassing, yes, but surprisingly relaxing - she was finding out that she _liked_ coloring, and toy animals, and building blocks, and of course, nowhere in the world felt as safe as Ma— um— Sayori’s warm arms or Mo— ahh— Yuri’s cuddly lap.

... therein laid the problem, though. The problem Monika hated, possibly more than the issues plaguing her lower-body muscle control. 

Grown-up Monika ( ~~she’s still an adult she _is_ she just means~~) has anxieties, sure. A lot of anxieties, actually. A whole lot more anxieties than normal psychologically-healthy people have. But also grown-up Monika is a grown-up, with skills and a carefully-cultivated charismatic air and if worst came to worse, egregious bribery - and grown-up Monika isn’t very afraid ( _very_ afraid) of losing her friends when she has a driver’s license and the club presidency and knows Natsuki’s favorite flavor of ice cream and precisely where to purchase the largest amount of it.

But Monika is a baby.

Not really. But also really, because even if she _isn’t_ a baby on the inside ( ~~she thinks~~ ) she _is_ a baby on the outside, and babies do not have _any_ of the previously mentioned redeeming qualities. Babies cry, shrilly, when things bother them, and babies make messes and don’t clean them up, and babies need to be picked up and carried around and tended to _constantly,_ every _day,_ and they don’t exactly return the favor.

The only thing that keeps a baby alive, really, is the frankly blind adoration of its parents,  
 ~~or dumb luck  
~~ and unfortunately, Monika has been stuck with... her friends.

Her friends who are _not_ her parents.

Her friends who likely don’t even have the bare-minimum biological dumbfoundery with which useless, leeching babies are rose-tinted into precious irreplaceable miracles.

At best, she supposes, her friends probably don’t want her keeling over before Sayori can put everything back to normal... but it’s not as if her death would be irreversible, either, not with the power Sayori possesses. It would be mostly a discomfiting inconvenience, one that might not outweigh the benefits of not having to deal with a stupid baby for the extended period of time needed to puzzle out how to re-rewrite the universe. And it’s not like they couldn’t just pawn her off on somebody else, either - when Monika, for whatever reason, panic-rewrote (why did that even _happen?)_ the fabric of the known universe, she did so _thoroughly._ Nobody remembers her how she was. Nobody outside of Sayori and Yuri and Natsuki knows that Monika _ever_ was an adult, or still mostly had the thoughts of one; all she is, to 99.9% of human society, is a whiny, weepy, disgusting, useless human infant.

So naturally, priority one on Monika’s conscious mind, every day, was how to be the _least_ intrusive presence humanly possible. 

Her friends, for whatever reason, were extending an awful lot of goodwill; it would be downright rude to not at least _try_ to return it, and in the process, keep the goodwill extended as _long_ as possible. 

( ~~of course, they would inevitably grow exhausted and bitter and angry and leave, but not yet please not yet~~ )

So Monika was ready to become a downright pro at squashing down unsightly impulses. After all, she was a baby again no matter how much she disliked it - why not do it right this time? When hunger panged in her stomach, she ignored it - no sense in fussing over something that would be addressed at mealtimes, no sooner and no later. When she accidentally hit parts of her dumb clumsy body against table legs or couch armrests, she yelped, but didn’t _cry_ \- what would be the point? Pain was pain and it would go away _quietly_ on its own, anyway. And, of course, when Sayori or Yuri moved into another room without her, she didn’t make a peep - no matter how empty her chest suddenly felt or how painfully fast her heart started beating. It was their darn house - they could go wherever they very well wanted to, no matter what the _baby_ had to say about it, which was nothing because the baby was being exceptionally good.

... that was the plan, anyway.

It worked well, at first (at least after the first few days, when it truly _sunk in),_ but - something - _something_ about whatever she did, or about being trapped in the body of a baby, started plucking away at her resolve like a bored cat on a Christmas sweater. She’d whimpered when M— _Sayori_ wandered out of the room, she’d cried when she tripped on her own two feet and fell on the front porch; her elocution was worse than ever and she started flinching at shadows and the dark, because the world was suddenly so much bigger and so _scary_ and nowhere felt safe, not anymore, not when she was so small with nothing at all to defend herself with - nowhere felt safe except pressed against Sayori, Yuri, Natsuki, but even that was undermined by the terrifying ~~memory~~ thought that this was erasing the time left on her clock before they gave up trying to handle such an unruly thing as a _baby._

Especially recently.

 _Especially_ recently.

* * *

Monika couldn’t sleep.

Not an especially big revelation for an adult fond of coffee and all related foodstuffs, but for a maybe-two-year-old, it was an unwelcome discovery and a tremendous issue.

 _Everything_ set her off. The slightest misgiving, the lightest discomfort, anything at all could turn a tenuous okayness into a full-blown meltdown, and Monika _hated_ it. If being somewhat clingy was straining on the grown-ups, then _boy,_ was gasping for breath because of a broken crayon a punishment from Hell - and she had been doing a _lot_ of irrational, near inconsolable wailing. It wasn’t her _fault_ \- she didn’t know how to make it _stop,_ it was out of control and horrifying and nearly physically hurt even before her limbs started flailing - but it didn’t matter if it was or if it wasn’t; it was the horrible result that mattered, and the horrible result that was surely wearing on all her mommi— her friends’ nerves.

At least, she consoles herself, she isn’t waking them in the middle of the night. No, when she wakes in the middle of the night, sweaty and shaking and ~~seeing them loom in perfect clarity over a cold little prison~~ with awfully damp pants, Monika at least has the presence of mind, for one _blessed_ problem, to bite her lip and keep her mouth shut. 

Which is the reason for all the exhausted meltdowns, the neurotic mood, and the (sigh) very painful rash, but if on top of everything, _everything,_ she was making them soothe her back to ~~NOT SLEEP~~ immovable drowsiness every time she woke from a constant nightmare, she’d be in an orphanage before the week was out.

At least she’s trying. At least she’s _trying, so_ **_hard,_ ** to be good.

 _(“Monika, sweetheart,” Yuri says, kneeling down and smiling_ ~~_tiredly_ ~~ _to her, sweetly,_ ~~_too sweetly, no, oh no no no no,_~~ _“Momm... er, I’m going to have to go to a long appointment tomorrow, and you know M— Sayori has work and Natsuki’s going to school, so... I’m going to be taking you to a daycare tomorrow, okay?”)_

Probably for the best that Monika had been too shocked to cry - only able to stare up at Yuri, eyes round and fearful, even as she’d doubled back and tried to explain how fun daycare would probably be, most of which Monika didn’t even end up hearing.

Yuri’s taking her away tomorrow.

Yuri’s _leaving_ her somewhere tomorrow.

Monika isn’t stupid. She might be a baby and she might be losing control of her impulses, little by little, and she might not be able to pee in the potty and she might be too clumsy to cut up a pancake with a fork and she might have forgotten how to read and how to add and she might be accidentally calling Mommy ‘Mommy’ half the time in her head but she’s not _stupid,_ and she knows exactly what kind of excuse just came out of Yuri’s mouth and she knows exactly how long it’s been coming.

So Monika doesn’t cry, even in an hour when she finally gets over the shock, not over dinner when everyone’s so much quieter than they always are, and not in bed when she’s crawling closer to Mama because maybe it’s the last time she’ll ever be hearing her heartbeat like this.

She might as well not make it worse.

* * *

Monika refuses to leave without Turtle.

He’s _her_ best friend, after all, and she needs him much more than she needs the mama ducky and her baby ducklings on the string (which would probably just make her sad) or her animal safari coloring book and crayons (which she would probably just break anyway). Turtle is hers, and she doesn’t let go of him for a second even through breakfast, change of pants, and outside clothes - she grips him dourly throughout it all, and even moreso when strapped in her carseat, and even _most_ so when Yuri is standing outside the daycare with her, holding her hand (which, even though she’s mad and sad and scared, Monika tries to remember the feeling of as good as she possibly can).

She doesn’t even remember what Yuri and the lady inside the daycare say to each other, or what Yuri said to _her,_ or anything at all besides the kiss Yuri plants on her forehead (which makes the aching in her heart and tummy hurt even _worse)_ and the pat she gives Turtle and how much more cavernous the front entryway feels once the door is closed and Monika’s mommy has walked away forever, because she was an _awful, horrible, useless_ little _baby._

“Hey, there, sweetie - come on, let’s get you inside, okay?”

Even if all the other times she did it were for stupid reasons, Monika thinks, hopelessly - she feels like _this_ time, at least, dropping to the floor, flailing out her legs and wailing _desperately_ were very, _very_ appropriate reactions.

* * *

It has been four hundred years and Monika’s mommy is gone and never ever ever _ever_ coming back.

Or at least it feels like four hundred years.

Realistically speaking (or at least a _little_ more realistically), it has probably been about two hours. Monika has learned a _lot_ in these two hours, including but not at all limited to the following:

  * Daycares were horribly noisy.
  * The grown-ups at daycare were _not_ any good at holding her.
  * None of the (frankly excessive amount of) toys, or games, or books, or crayons or fingerpaints or barely-audible television shows _at_ daycare were interesting, or fun, or exciting, or nice, 
  * _Or_ cool, _or_ good enough to even _consider_ letting go of Turtle for,
  * And she wants to go home.



The grown-up lady whom she has been telling this to, between miserable snuffles and other weepy noises, doesn’t have a whole lot to say about any of this. Maybe she can’t understand Monika through the speech affect _and_ the crying, or maybe she’s just gotten very good at ignoring abandoned sobbing little babies and continuing to stick jars of Play-Doh and boxes of Duplo at them until they forgot they were supposed to be sad. Monika might be a stupid snotty baby, but she’s not _that_ stupid, not yet at least. Eventually, she realizes with a sinking feeling in her tummy, she probably _would_ be. Maybe eventually she’d be _so_ stupid that she’d forget anyone ever left her here at all and then— and _then_ what? Would _anyone_ ever come for her, or would she be stuck in this horrible primary-colored pris—

“Oh, sweetie… c’mon, now, there has to be _something_ around here that’ll cheer you up. Maybe you’re hungry, huh?”

Monika grimaces, both at the interruption and the idea. _No,_ she is _not_ hungry! How could she be _hungry?_ She’s been feeling _sick_ for hours, and hours, and, and this lady couldn’t even _tell._ Stupid stupid _stupid,_ mean, not— not-listening, good for nothing… !

 _Mama would’ve knowed ‘m feeling too yucky to eat,_ she thinks, squeezing Turtle around the middle despondently. Mama _would’ve,_ back when she still liked baby Monnie - she even knew back _before_ Monnie was a baby, when she was big and she got all anxious and, and she’d hold her hand and tell her everything’d be okay, but now she was a baby and she was bad and noisy and too much work and Mama didn’t _love_ her anymore and— 

“Oh, no, sweetheart, _please_ don’t cry,”

Monika hiccups, fresh tears dropping onto Turtle’s plushy head, and ducks away from the lady’s outstretched hand as she starts to cry in earnest again, wriggling under the tiny, toddler-sized table the lady had put her next to.

She doesn’t _want_ to eat. She doesn’t _want_ to play, and she doesn’t _want_ TV she doesn’t _want_ crayons she doesn’t _want_ stories or games or songs she wants _Mama,_ and _Mommy,_ and _nee-nee_ and **_home_** but she can’t _go_ home, because she doesn’t _have_ a home, and she can’t think of a single sadder thing in the entire world so she lays on her tummy and _cries._

* * *

 _"... I just_ — _I’m just really worried, ma’am, I think something’s_ _wrong_ _. I’ve just, I’ve never seen any little one_ **_cry_ ** _like this…”  
_ _“It happens, Morikawa, kids with separation anxiety come in all the time. I know it’s hard_ —  _yes_ _, don’t give me that look. I know it’s hard seeing them cry, and you haven’t really had the chance to toughen up from it, but trust me, she will be_ **_fine._ ** _Why don’t you try seeing if the playground perks her up a bit?”  
_ _“I… I guess I’ll try that. Alright.”_

...

Outside is no better than inside. Monika is certain that the daycare lady is trying to torture her, probably as a form of payback for making her hear her shrieky little wails for so long.

Yes, Monika has stopped crying. Sort of; she is still definitely leaking tears everywhere, but the rest of her seems to have finally picked up the message that nobody was coming to help her, nothing was going to save her, so she might as well just be quiet. At daycare lady’s cajoling request, once all the last dredges of fight had gone out of her and she’d had her allotted 30 minutes of under-the-table time, she had trudged out to the little plastic playground to sit miserably in the sand instead of miserably on the floor.

“Monika, sweetie, don’t you want to come play on the slide?”

No. No she does not. Even if she were interested in _sliding_ at a time like this, she thinks, glaring at the playset, the fact that there are other kids climbing around all over it makes it less appealing than mashed turkey, no matter how daycare lady tried to insist it was a _fun_ thing to be doing. Most of those other kids are bigger than her and even more reckless and clumsy; they’d probably shove her off or trip over her and then she’d get _hurt_ and have to deal with being hurt with nobody to kiss it better, or give her the special band-aids that _she_ picked out at the store with Mommy, and rather than give daycare lady the probable satisfaction of seeing her face crumple in despair again she shoves her face into the top of Turtle’s head.

Daycare lady sighs.

(Monika isn’t _surprised,_ but it stabs at her heart anyway.) 

There’s a yelp from the general direction of the playground; daycare lady mumbles something like _“oh no”_ under her breath, and Monika can hear her get up and run off towards what now sounds like - surprise - somebody who fell down. 

Monika is sitting alone in the sand, sniffling into a stuffed animal.

 _(Was this_ **_it?_** _)_

Was this all there was going to _be_ anymore? Just Monika, all alone, trapped with a pile of strange screaming children and tired grown-ups trying too hard to be sweet? Nobody to care about her anymore, nobody that understood all the little noises she made, what it meant when she grimaced; nobody to hold her and cuddle her and keep her _safe,_ just somebody being paid by the hour to put food in her mouth and carry her to and from the yard…

Was this _it?_

Monika’s tummy turns even harder, chest feeling cavernous and empty and horribly, horribly _sad._ Just… sad. She isn’t surprised - she knows, from _experience,_ that this was what being tiny, and useless, and _two_ , is like.

But she _is_ sad.

And she doesn’t want to be here anymore. She doesn’t want the awful, constant reminder that she’s just some unwanted _thing_ again, some waste of space and time and energy - but she doesn’t have a _home_ anymore, either, and she just doesn’t know what to do. She just _doesn’t_ know what to do.

 _Maybe Turtle’d know whad’do do…_ she thinks, looking down at her last, most trusted friend of all. She knows he can’t _talk,_ that he’s just a plushy animal full of all her best hugs and love, but the fleeting impulse to look _up_ to somebody— she feels— she thinks maybe he’s smarter than her right now, maybe, or at least maybe he’d know how to make her feel better. 

Wouldn’t he? 

She stares, drained, at the plush turtle’s slightly-lopsided smile,

And then, eyes tracking slowly upward, at a nearly-hidden gap in the playground’s wooden fence.

* * *

“W— We go’da be _ky-et,_ Tuw’dle,”

 _Okay,_ Turtle says, because he understands the importance of being quiet in a good escape plot.

Monika is toddling through a forest. It seems a lot like a forest, at least, because there’s a lot of trees and bushes around instead of people. Nobody, it seemed, had noticed a tiny little girl and her turtle wriggling through the broken fence; but Monika didn’t want to undermine her own luck. Everyone knows that when you’re _escaping_ somewhere, you have to be very, very quiet. Anywhere you have to escape from probably has guards, or dogs, both of which could be easily alerted by something so noisy as a baby and a turtle’s conversation.

It’s good that Turtle is very quiet, for this exact reason. Monika hugs him to her a little tighter, feeling all the more attached to him by the second; that’s okay, probably. She _is_ a baby, and he _is_ her only friend, and they haven’t got much left but each other— so this was… this was okay.

Sort of.

It’s _cold_ outside, which was less of a problem sitting next to a wide-open heated building - Turtle’s shell is very plushy and soft, but it only does so much to warm up her hands, and only half of them at that, and her ears and nose and such are still very shivery. She could handle it; she’s brave, and strong, and Turtle was counting on her to not drop him. But it _was_ cold, and the wind rustling through all the yellow leaves is a little bit frightening, because scary things made that kind of sound too.

“‘m no’d s-scaw’ed,” she mumbles, and tries very hard not to think about snakes. Or ghosts. Ghosts (maybe) weren’t real, but they _were_ scary, and snakes _were_ real and ate turtles. And maybe ate babies, too, if they were all by themselves. 

Monika’s feets speed up a little bit without her noticing, damp ground beneath her going _slk-slk-slk_ as she went. Maybe there _were_ ghosts outside. They weren’t real, but they didn’t have to be _real_ to be scary, or to be places; there were ghosts inside the costume store, and wolves, and pumpkin-head people and big scary monsters, and they could be _anywhere._ What if one of them wanted to hurt her? What if a wolf wanted to grab and bite and rip up Turtle? 

_I don’t_ **_think_ ** _ghosts and pumpkin people live in forests,_ Turtle tries to say, but Monika is already thinking of far too many scary things and her feets are moving far too fast to listen. Not-real monsters were big, and scary, but what about monsters that _were_ real? 

(What about the monsters that Monika remembers?)

Turtle knows everything, all the things in her head, because he’s Monika’s best friend and he has to _live_ there— so Turtle _knows._ He has to. He knows about the big black birds, and Monika’s bad dreams, and why Monika knows Mommy is never going to come back for her and why the awful icky throw-up feelings in Monika’s sad tummy are _familiar,_ not new.

Turtle knows that hawks drop little baby turtles on their backs, and _break_ them, and that nobody who could help ever, ever, _ever_ hears the baby turtle cry.

So he can’t say anything.

Monika - eyes filling with tears, heart thumping so hard it hurts, feet more skidding than running along the slick forest floor, now - Monika _knows_ that monsters and bad things are real, real, _real,_ and she knows that a plush turtle can’t save her from anything and she knows that nobody’s going to come back for her, and she’s so caught up in knowing and running and being so _scared_ and alone that she doesn’t,

At all,

Realize where she _is,_

Or what she’s running _towards,_

Until she’s tripping over her own two feet - or a leaf, or a puddle, she doesn’t _know_ \- and falling down towards something black and flat and hard and—

~~**_Scary._ ** ~~

**_“What_** _in the_ ** _world_** _are you doing?!”_

Something _yanks_ Monika very very quickly _away_ from the roadway she had been about to fall into, and the sharp tug and the loud voice and the hard squeeze around her middle are— 

**_Scary,_** and, and she doesn’t even know who’s behind her, and they sounded loud and **_mad_** and, and there’s cars in the road, and she almost fell in, and her head hurts and her hands are cold and hurts and she’s up in the air and her feets can’t feel the ground and Turtle is muddy and she doesn’t know what to do anymore, she doesn’t know where she is, and she doesn’t know who grabbed her— 

Maybe it’s a monster or maybe it’s a bad person, who takes babies and hurts them, or maybe it’s just her real mumma and pappa going to lock her back up in the closet for running away and crying so loud and she peed her pants again and she’s **_such a bad bad bad bad bad bad bad_** ** _bad_** **_bad_** **_baby_** ** _._**

(she never ever ever wants to move _ever_ again and she sags heavily into the ouchy grab fingers and spits and coughs because it ouches and she wants to get dropped again, _right now,_ everything has to be quiet right _now,_ everything has to stop happening forever **right now,** and she **_screams_** until she thinks her voice is going to stop working and even longer than that.)

* * *

 ** _“MO-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-OMM—Y!”_**

Yuri’s first thought is that Monika has broken her _spine._

An irrational conclusion, _yes,_ but after the ear-splitting _shriek_ one surely would have cause to jump straight there. She quickly fumbles Monika into a less painful position, but whatever damage had been done in that split second was _done_ \- the little girl was as limp as a sack of potatoes, screaming her tiny lungs out for half the country to hear, face red and soaked with tears and utterly miserable as she spluttered out half a gasp before launching directly into another shriek.

“M—Monika?! Monika a— are y— Monika— _Monika,”_ Yuri is almost glad there’s nobody else (outside of a motor vehicle ~~don’t think about that~~ ) around to see her make an absolute fool out of herself trying to speak like an adult to an inconsolably howling _baby_ but— but this was _Monika._ Monika who hated being treated like a child and resented being talked over and... 

Screaming so loudly that Yuri was going to be left with permanent hearing loss.

If she has a problem with the proceeding events, she’s going to have to air those grievances at a later point. 

Taking a deep breath, (and relatively certain that the squirming baby’s spine was not injured,) Yuri tucks Monika’s flailing limbs firmly and carefully close to her body - cradles her against herself in the most encompassing position she can manage, keeping her gently pressed into her sweater and presence and heartbeat, before proceeding to lean into being _mommy_ as hard as humanly possible. 

Yuri didn’t even know she could _make_ some of these cooing noises, has no idea from what hidden depths this particular rhythmic hushing came; but, really, the only part that matters in the end is that it works. Monika sobs loud and long and heart-rendingly _broken_ until she... _doesn’t_ \- until she stutters and hiccups, turning her little head towards Yuri’s one-woman orchestra of soothing noises, until she quiets to nothing but shivery snuffles, staring glassy-eyed and tiny and utterly _lost_ into Yuri’s worried countenance. 

“... m-mo-momm-my?” 

“Yes, sweetheart?” Yuri responds, reaching to brush Monika’s bangs away from her eyes - and freezing as fresh tears start to fall, Monika heaving in a whimpery little breath as her face crumples in an indistinct, if utterly _miserable_ expression.

“P— P, P’ _ease,_ d-do’, do’n, d— do’n y’ea-a-af— m-me-e _‘ehide—“_

_What?_

“I’s— I’s-soww, wy-y! I s— I so— _sowwy_ I bad I s— I w-wan’d— wan’da g-go h— h _o’be_ p, _p’ease_ M-Mommy don’ _go_ don’ y’eaf b-baby a’yone f’efv— er a’d e’fver M, Mommy _y-yyy—“_

Monika trails off into another exhausted little fit of tears, gripping Yuri’s sweater in both tiny hands so tightly she trembles. 

“W-What?” Yuri gasps, holding Monika closer to her than ever. “Sweetheart, why— you’re not bad, baby, no, _no,_ you’re not!” 

“‘on-nika _bad!”_ The weepy little girl insists, hiding her face in Yuri’s sweater - “Mom-my Mama N-Nee-nee don’w, _wan’d_ b-baby Mon’ka a-adymow! M-Mom-my p’ud b-baby _do’w_ a’d g-goed _’way_ f, f’wefer’defer, n’defer ‘n, ‘n,” 

“No, _no,_ sweetie _no,”_ Yuri hushes, hand trembling as she brushes through Monika’s hair, “Mommy loves you so so _much,_ baby, Mommy and Mama and nee-nee _love_ baby Monika _so much._ Mommy would never, _ever, ever_ leave her baby behind forever and ever. Never. Never never _never.”_

Monika whimpers. 

“Not when my baby’s having a hard time with all her big feelings,” Yuri continues, tucking her head close to Monika’s as she sways gently side to side, “Not when my baby’s having trouble with her naps and her ninight times, not when my baby’s being silly and grumpy over the color of her spoon, not _ever._ Never, ever, _ever.”_

“...”

Monika sucks in a shaky breath. 

“... M, Mon’ka k, k’in... k’in go _h-h’obe?”_ She whispers, in such a tiny, fragile voice that Yuri’s heart snaps clean in _half,_ biting her lip as if in fear that Yuri would say _no._

“Of _course,_ sweetpea, of _course_ you can come home. We’re going to tell poor Miss Morikawa that you’re safe and sound,” she adds, very suddenly remembering the circumstances under which she’s holding her teary-eyed baby by the side of a road, “and then baby Monika and Turtle are coming right home for hugs and dinners and bathtimes and bottles and snuggles and ninights with Mommy and Mama and nee-nee, lots and _lots._ Okay?” 

“O—Ot-tay, ota-ay, Mom- _my,”_

Monika buries her face in Yuri’s sweater, nodding shakily even as she still clings with a white-knuckled grip - and Yuri, holding her tightly, rubs the back of her head for a little while longer as she begins to make her way back towards the daycare center.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> update: baby baking edition

“I think,” Yuri says softly, “that we may have been going about this the wrong way.”

Sayori and Natsuki share a worried glance.

It’s late at night; well, late enough for a turned-two-year-old to be fast asleep, and not quite late enough for the remaining adults to have turned in for the night just yet, which is why Yuri has deemed it an appropriate time to have a family meeting.

Family meeting. Still such a very odd thing to think about, and yet…

“Um. Yeah.” Says Natsuki, knees folded up in her chair - she had seemed the  _ most  _ distressed to hear about Monika’s unfortunate escapade, somehow, and now is fixing her gaze to the middlest point of the dining-room table. “Something’s definitely wrong.”

“I— I didn’t— Yuri, how could she think that we don’t  _ love  _ her?” Sayori asks, looking helplessly to her as if Yuri could provide any concrete answer. “That doesn’t even make any sense! We were  _ dating _ before— all this stuff happened, weren’t we?”

“Yup,” Natsuki responds, flatly.

“And I dunno, I’m no dating expert but I think that usually  _ implies—“ _

“Sayori,” Yuri cuts in, reaching a hand over to still Sayori’s, “I don’t think this has  _ too  _ much to do with that. I’m fairly sure that  _ adult  _ Monika is perfectly aware that dating somebody means you do love them.”

“She  _ was  _ always kinda… Monika about it, though.” Natsuki says, tracing circles on the table. “You know. Anxious about everything. It’s not like babies are  _ less  _ anxious than adults.”

“Yes, that… you’re right, Natsuki, that was certainly a blind spot.”

“We haven’t been any different to her, though!” Sayori exclaims, frowning. “We’re all doing our best to treat her just like Monika, and listen to her and make sure we’re not going over her head or anything or…”

“Yes, well. I…” Yuri pauses, staring into her mug of tea for a very pensive moment. “I think that may  _ be  _ the problem.”

“... huh?”

“Monika is— I don’t think,” Yuri continues, “I don’t think that Monika is upset about being a baby again because it’s an inconvenience for her.”

Natsuki keeps her eyes fixed on the table.

“...you don’t?” Sayori asks, cautiously, glancing between Natsuki’s grim countenance and Yuri’s worried expression with quite a bit of trepidation. “Guys, did— did something else  _ happen? _ ”

“At school,” Natsuki mumbles, shooting a loaded glare at Yuri for the briefest moment. “During finals.”

“Monika’s… the headmaster showed up in the hallway,” Yuri says, “Mr. Shimizu. Monika… panicked.”

“Monika  _ screamed,  _ shook like a leaf, started sobbing, complained her finger hurt later which is what she was saying when this mess  _ started—“ _

“Natsuki,”

“— without a thing being wrong with it, drew freaky pictures of a  _ monster  _ attacking her and she’s been having sleep issues for  _ weeks _ now and  _ Yuri I told you so goddamnit,” _ Natsuki hisses, Sayori shrinks back, Yuri grimaces.

“Y-You’re saying—?”

“I think Monika is reliving a portion of her life she would rather not revisit.” Yuri says. Natsuki  _ tch _ es, turns away with tightly crossed arms.

“... oh.” Says Sayori, quietly.

“Yes. Oh,” Yuri sighs. “That alone is bad enough, but… Sayori, I can’t see what it is you’ve been picking at, but - whether it’s the fault of  _ that  _ or simply a quirk of human nature - I believe Monika might be… conflating her experiences, to an extent. Confusing them, maybe. Remembering and feeling as though she is one thing…”

“... while...  _ kind _ of knowing she’s not,” Sayori finishes, head lowered despondently onto her arms. “Oh, no.”

“All this in mind, I… don’t think we’re going about this quite right anymore.”

There is a brief period of silence.

“So what do we do, then?” Sayori asks, quietly. “I don’t want to— I don’t want Monika to think that we don’t love her, or care about her, I just thought—“

“We all did,” Yuri says, warning a sullen Natsuki with a glance. “And none of us meant any harm. It wasn’t a wild conclusion to draw.” 

“We gotta change what we’re doing  _ now,  _ then, because we  _ do  _ know,” Natsuki humphs. “Got any bright ideas there?”

“Yes. I think we treat her like the child she currently is.”

Sayori coughs in surprise.

“Because,” Yuri continues, “she thinks that what she is - a child - isn’t worth loving. She thinks that someone would  _ abandon  _ a  _ two-year-old _ at a daycare center for the heinous crime of existing as a two-year-old,”

“Which isn’t  _ true!” _

“It’s not true. You’re right. So  _ I  _ think that what we  _ ought _ to do is prove that she is loved and wanted  _ regardless _ of if she is two years old or a grown adult.” Yuri sips at her tea. “Constantly dancing around the fact that she’s a small child has probably,  _ inadvernently,  _ been reinforcing that idea in her head that she’s only valuable  _ big.” _

“... ah…”

“Well… putting it out _ that _ way,” Natsuki says, which is about as much agreement as Yuri thinks she is currently going to get.

“Besides,” she says, sighing, “as much as she likes to insist that she  _ doesn’t, _ Monika needs as much love and attention as anyone else. And we haven’t been  _ neglecting  _ her—“ Yuri holds up a hand to Sayori, who was looking very ready to interject, “— from an  _ adult  _ standpoint. From the standpoint of a child, even a child trying their stubborn best to be precociously independent… well. I think it’s been somewhat untenable.”

“Yeah,” Sayori says, morosely, “I think Yuri’s right.”

“You can’t be suggesting we flick the switch  _ overnight, _ though,” Natsuki says. “That sounds like a living nightmare no matter how you put it.”

“No. I’m not suggesting flicking any sort of switch, I’m suggesting that we stop treating the things she needs as out-of-the-ordinary; apologizing preemptively for bearing witness to, what? Nothing but ordinary accommodations for children. She thinks she’s being a burden, and I vote to counteract that with  _ unconditional  _ acceptance. Love. I don’t think she knows that’s something she’s supposed to be getting.”

“...  _ so… _ ”

“So… treat her like a mama would?” Sayori tries, cheeks flushing lightly. “I mean, listen to her, and everything, but,”

“Yes. Treat her like she’s loved, and important, and in a way she can understand with  _ both _ lines of thought. We... can’t neglect her inner child, even if she would like us to.”

“And we  _ do  _ love her! We love her as huge tall girlfriend Monika and we love her as little bitty baby Monika and we’re gonna make sure she knows from now on!”

“Yeah,” Natsuki nods, “seems like a solid plan.”

“And I think she won’t be very much recalcitrant about it, for the next few days,” Yuri murmurs - she must have had her, quote,  _ patented  _ guilty expression, as Sayori rather suddenly pats her on the back, smiling down at her reassuringly.

“We know  _ now,  _ right?” She says, squeezing Yuri’s shoulder. “I think it’s a good plan. I— I really really really want little Monika to know we love her, just as much as big Monika.”

Yuri offers a smile in return, reaching up to cup her hand over Sayori’s. “And if all goes well, I think she will.”

\---

Monika has been spending a lot of very quiet days at home.

Quietness, after all, was the best condition to be taking naps in; and Monika has been taking a  _ lot  _ of naps. Not on purpose, or anything - she’s a big girl and she doesn’t  _ have  _ to take naps - but Mommy and Mama have been holding her almost all the time and they’re very big and soft and warm and easy to take naps on. Is all. Monika has been feeling a lot less weepy than she has just been tired, and she has been feeling less and less tired every time she wakes up in someone’s arms.

Right now, Monika is not taking a nap.  _ Mama  _ is, she’s dozing peacefully on the couch behind her, but Monika is laying on her tummy and coloring in her coloring book with Turtle (who is helping her pick out colors). He has been much more talkative lately, which Monika thinks is nice, because she likes having someone that’s easy to talk to and especially someone that knows green is the best color for birds.

_ I think… that one. _

_ “Pi’k?”  _ Monika asks, rather incredulously. 

_ The best kind of tigers are pink! _

Hmmn. Well. Monika can’t say that she’s ever seen a pink tiger before, but it  _ was  _ a pretty crayon and color and Turtle was very sure of himself so, all considered, it was probably okay. Fishing the crayon out of the pack reminds her about chalk, and that reminds her about the picture Mama showed her, of the kitty from her job that layed down on chalk drawings and turned a  _ lotta  _ different colors and maybe this tiger was a white tiger that layed down on chalk - which she absentmindedly tells Turtle about at length, lisping around her —

Um. 

Her… the pacifier that Mama gave her, which… which she  _ was _ , using, yes, but only because  _ Mama  _ gave it to her, and because it made her tummy hurt less when she got worried, and because it had a turtle on it… which… okay, Monika admits to herself, cheeks flushing pink, she had thought that using a pacifier was silly and babyish and not a good idea, but…

… but Mama— Sayori—  _ Mama  _ had asked her very nicely to try it, and Monika guessed that she couldn’t say it was a  _ bad  _ idea until she had at least tried once, and then it felt  _ nice.  _ It made her feel,  _ safe,  _ like she wasn’t quite so wobbly inside anymore, and Mama hadn’t—  _ grimaced,  _ or made fun, or told her  _ nevermind, knock that off _ — she’d said Monika looked very cute, and it matched her eyes, and then she’d kissed her forehead and brought her downstairs and— and that was that. Mommy said she looked sweet and Na’ski thought the turtle was a good idea, since she liked them (she  _ remembered) _ and… and now Monika had a pacifier, and a clip for her shirt in case it fell. That was that.

_ Ah, Monika— _

“Hey, sprout, whatcha up to?”

Monika, caught up in drawing and thinking, didn’t notice Na’ski-nee approaching until she was crouched in front of her, peering interestedly down at the coloring book. Monika blinks up at her, the brief startlement causing her pacifier to bob quickly in her mouth for a moment.

“Um’b,” she says, lifting her crayon-holding hand up from the page, presentatively. “D’igew pi’tshuw.”

“Oh! Coloring in a tiger, huh. I like the color you picked out, it’s real striking.”

“T— T’an’gyu,” Monika says, a little bashful; it’s just a coloring page! But Na’ski-nee sounds like she really  _ means  _ it and it makes her feel kind of happy that her big sister— her— well not really but— but that her big sister likes it. 

“Hey, psst. I wanted to ask,” Na’ski says - leaning in a little bit like she wanted to tell Monika a  _ secret _ , and Monika widens her eyes, interested - “Do you wanna come help me with something? Surprise for Sayocchan?”

“Su’pise f’ Mama?” Monika parrots, mouth opening (a  _ little _ bit - her mouth seems better than her brain at keeping her pacifier from falling out, which…) and Na’ski nods, winking conspiratorially.

“Uh-huh, a surprise for your mama. It’ll be fu~n,” she cajoles, but Monika was already very much on board.

“Uhhuh!”

“Hehehe, alright, good! Quiet now, she’s still napping, huh.”

“Oo’s, uh— yuh.”

“S’alright, glad you’re excited. C’mere, now, up ya go…”

Na’ski is just as good at remembering that Monika and Turtle go together as Monika is; she scoops both her and important bestest friend up in one go, toting Monika out and over to the kitchen. Going ups used to make her tummy ache a bit, but she knows Na’ski is strong and good at carrying and Monika only squeezes Turtle a  _ little  _ tighter, and Na’ski pats her side reassuringly, and her tummy isn’t scared enough to hurt.

Na’ski deposits her in the middle of the very spacious countertop, and when Monika looks around, she can see there’s lots of  _ things  _ out everywhere - the mixer, butter-sticks, sugar and flour and a rolling-pin - and her feet kick out a little bit in excitement before she can really think about it.

_ ”Coo’gys?!” _

“Yup, cookies,” Na’ski laughs, placing a fond pat on Monika’s head. “I found a cute new recipe I really wanna try out. You wanna help me make them?”

Monika gasps. “I— I h’ewp?”

“Mhm! Baker’s assistant Monika,” Na’ski says, grinning. “Whaddya say?”

“U-Uhhuh! P’eas! P’eas!!”

“It’s a deal! Let’s getcha a lil’ somethin’ to cover your shirt, and— ah, I got an idea,” Na’ski hums, eyes lighting on Turtle. “Is it okay if Turtle sits up in your highchair, sprout? He can help taste-test when we’re done, I think. Turtles have very wise opinions on cookies.”

Monika looks down at Turtle, sucking pensively at her pacifier for a moment. Well… that didn’t sound too bad. Turtle would like being able to help with that part, right?

_ Oh! I’d love helping with tasting! Cookies are yummy,  _ Turtle says, sounding very excited.  _ And then I can see you do all the big parts, with thumbs! _

Oh, right! Monika forgets sometimes that turtles do not have hands like she does. Turtle helping with the tasting part  _ definitely _ sounds like the best plan, then, and she nods decisively, holding him out to let Na’ski put him up in her highchair. Na’ski even buckles him in so he won’t fall if he leans over too far, which is very conscientious since turtles are scared of falling, and Na’ski is definitely the very very best big sister Monika knows.

“Alright, let’s hop to it, then!”

Na’ski helps Monika tie on a little apron, roll up her sleeves, and even helps her wash her hands at the sink  _ (“Gotta make sure to stay clean when you’re baking!”)  _ before they start making the cookie recipe! Monika… Monika can’t, um, read the sheet that Na’ski printed out, which she forgets until she looks and maybe her face looks very raincloudy, because Na’ski starts reading it out right away - and she  _ even  _ makes little pen-drawings in the blank parts of the paper, of eggs and butter-sticks and sugar-cups, which Monika  _ can  _ read. Na’ski has to do some of the things, like cracking eggs - although Monika wasn’t very good at that part even when her hands were bigger, she thinks - but she lets Monika do  _ lots  _ of other parts, like pouring cups of sugar and putting sticks into the big mixing bowl, and even…

“Here we go,” Na’ski says, popping open the lid of the flour container; then, passing a plastic measuring cup into Monika’s hand, grins. “Can you scoop out four cups for us, love?”

…  _ Monika?  _ Monika should scoop the flour? She looks very quizzical indeed, and Na’ski giggles a bit.

“It’ll be fun, right? It’s okay to make a little mess, you know. That’s half the fun of baking,” she says, affectionately tapping a finger to the end of Monika’s nose… and leaving a little smudge of flour behind, making Monika squeak.  _ “I  _ bet you can get four scoops of that flour in that bowl just fine, even if there’s some spills.”

Monika blinks, looking thoughtfully at the measuring cup in her hands…

… and drags it through the flour, pulling out a slightly-mounded scoop.

There  _ were _ some spills; about half of a scoop ended up on the outside of the bowl rather than the inside, and there was a very clear trail of white speckles between the bowl and flour container,  _ and  _ Monika’s apron, when she looks down, appears to have about a cup of flour on it alone (when had that happened? should she not have held it to her chest when she scooted to the bowl?) - but Na’ski doesn’t scold her even a  _ little  _ bit. Actually, Na’ski thought she did a  _ good job _ .

“You look like the world’s  _ most  _ adorable ghost,” she giggles, pressing a kiss to Monika’s forehead before Monika can even react, “Onto the next ingredient!”

Monika smiles, shyly-surprisedly- _ happily,  _ and crawls over to look for the next drawn step.

…

“Now! The last part,” Na’ski says, letting out a winded sigh of accomplishment.  _ “And  _ the most important one, I should say…”

Monika looks up at her, eyes wide and eager to know what would come next. The dough was all rolled out, like shape-cookies, Monika thinks - but Na’ski hadn’t brought out any of the metal cookie shapes, so what was she planning to do? 

“Hold up your hand, okay?” She says, gently maneuvering Monika’s hand into an open position - then, rummaging in the cabinet below for a moment, emerges with a single round shape, measuring it against Monika’s hand, which fits all the way inside. “Ah, perfect! Now…”

Na’ski leans down, cutting one circle of dough, then gestures Monika to it.

“Press your hand down into it,” she says, “Liiiike this!” 

And carefully presses Monika’s palm down, leaving a tiny little impression in the dough.

“Neat, huh!” Na’ski grins. “Then we can put jam in ‘em. Lil’ handprint cookies!”

“... M— _ Mony’ga  _ ha’npi’nd?” Monika says, sounding rather astonished - and more than a little… small.

“Yeah, Monika’s handprints.” Na’ski replies - peeking her face into Monika’s line of vision, gently squeezing her little hand. “That’s a real important part, you know. I’m really happy you’re helping me.”

Monika blinks, looking down at the little handprint in the cookie dough… carefully. Very, very thoughtfully. Na’ski lets her, holds her hand warm and safe while Monika thinks, pacifier liquid in her mouth.

“... o’day,” she finally says, wriggling a little bit on her seat. “O— O’day. M-Mony’ga h’ewb, ha, ha’npi’n-‘s. H’ewp.”

“Ah, that’s great! Okay, I’ll do the cookie-cuttin’, you do the handprintin’, got it?” Na’ski says, briefly nabbing the toe of Monika’s sock, affectionate.

Monika giggles sweetly, nodnodnodding up and down. “G’awwwit!”

…

“Aah, you two made  _ cookies!?” _

“Su’piiiise!” Monika sing-songs, waving out her hands presentatively. Natsuki beams, nodding to the fresh-baked plate of cookies on the table before them.

“Surprise~!” She chimes in, chuckling. “Me an’ Monika thought it’d be a nice thing, wakin’ up to fresh cookies. New recipe, too!”

“Mony’ga  _ h’ewpd’d!”  _ Monika squeaks, wiggling excitedly in Natsuki’s arms. “Pu’dded, pu’dded ha’np’i-ds inna mid’dwe!”

“Oh my  _ gosh,  _ you  _ did!”  _ Sayori gasps, smiling brighter than the sun as she leans in to look. “That’s  _ wonderful! _ Oh, these are so cute, sweetheart, thank you so  _ much!” _

“Mama, Mama yi’ge a’ coo’gys?”

“Mama  _ loves _ the cookies, honey,  _ thank  _ you! And thank you, too,” she laughs, kissing Natsuki’s lips and Monika’s cheek in quick turn, “You two are just the  _ sweetest,  _ oh my gosh.”

“Sweeter than jam-handprint-cookies?” Natsuki asks, mischievously - Sayori grins, slyly glancing towards the plate. 

“Weeeeell, I dunno… I haven’t even tried one yet~!”

“Tuw’dle say’d yummy!” Monika says, holding him up for emphasis. He  _ did  _ say they were very yummy, and he took his tasting job very seriously, so that means he was definitely telling the truth. Sayori drops a kiss on the top of his head, too, and Monika squirms happily.

“Oh, did he? Well, I’m very glad to know these cookies have been Turtle-approved!” Sayori says. “Ahh, now I’m even more excited to try one! C’mere, cutie, let’s you and me go taste-test some of these for ourselves,”

And Monika, giggly and warm, has never been quite so happy to be lifted into her arms.


End file.
